


Autumn Road

by Tabi_essentially



Series: Wartime verse [10]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Friendship/Love, Grief/Mourning, Love, M/M, Marriage, Near Death Experience, Old Age, Road Trips, Second Chances, happiness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-09
Updated: 2012-02-09
Packaged: 2017-10-30 20:53:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 71,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/335946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabi_essentially/pseuds/Tabi_essentially
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A little girl who has spent lifetimes in limbo appeals to the team for help. Arthur and Eames, having recently decided to go halves on  a safe-house, find themselves anything but safe as they try to bring the girl and her mother to Cobb's dream institute on the other side of the country. They are not the only ones with an interest in the girl, who is proficient in more than just dream-sharing. She challenges the idea that reality is as simply defined as "being awake." This story also follows the characters in a "through the years" ending, therefore, heed the warnings! I wanted to deal with loss, and in some cases, moving on, in a realistic way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> I want to thank Neomeruru for doing the beautiful art for this, and for being my extremely patient beta. But if we're being honest, I was pretty unfair with her. I wrote the first half of this in August when I signed up, then I let it sit and rot until the beginning of January, more or less, when I finished it. (You might be able to feel the difference in the story.) So, I did not leave her a lot of time to do both the art, and the beta-ing of the end. Therefore, the mistakes are all my own! However, she was still immensely helpful in catching mistakes, telling me when to STFU and cut back, and reining Arthur in a little. Thank you so much for everything, Neomeruru!
> 
> This story makes reference to the stories I've written in the past, and takes place in the same 'verse, but you needn't have read them to follow this. 
> 
> Concrit is, of course, entirely welcome and encouraged. I'll listen to any opinion, as it will all help make me a better writer. :)

  


**Autumn Road**

Art by [neomeruru](http://neomeruru.livejournal.com/). Check out and comment on her art at her [art masterpost on LJ](http://neomeruru.livejournal.com/308250.html).

The safe house was hot as hell when Arthur got there, high summer having turned it into a musty, stale oven. Outside the large windows and double-doors, what Arthur had first taken for weeds and brush, had, in the lushness of summer, proved to be towering grapevines and prickly raspberries. The raspberries were overripe, nearly dripping off the vines. He didn't want to cut anything back. The last thing this place needed was to look lived-in. At least from the outside.

  


He'd already cased the entire house. The safe house was still safe. He had also started the genny, turned on the gas and plugged in the fridge. Dust layered the various surfaces inside, but he would deal with that later. 

Currently he was more interested in the folded letter that lay on top of a stack of DVDs. He read it as he sweated through his clothes.

_A--_

_I realized after I bought the television that not only is there no landline here, there is no cable either._

(He heard Eames's voice as he read it, the drawn out vowels, ' _Iiiii-ther._ ')

_So I left a few DVDs if you find yourself bored. Now I know you've got movies on your laptop but there is something special about watching films on a television screen. I've left a few records too, they are stacked underneath the record player. I would have stored some of those godawful frozen pizzas you eat, but I didn't like to leave the freezer running and didn't know when you'd be back. Wouldn't want to draw mice and rats. I left some canned soup, but other than that I'm afraid the cupboard is a bit bare. There is a market on the way here._

_\--E_

There was a hastily added arrow at the bottom of the paper, indicating that he should turn it over.

_PS One more thing. I think I saw bear tracks or something when I went to look at the pond out back. Please don't get mauled by a bear._

Arthur folded the note in his hand and smoothed it out. ' _Bare,_ ' he thought, had probably reminded Eames of bear tracks he thought he saw. That was how Eames's mind worked, connecting words like that; he was very aware of his own subconscious and the connection would not have been lost on him.

And that was it. No, 'To my darling' opening and no unnecessary 'forever love' at the sign-off. Eames had been up here, to the safe-house they had decided to share five months ago. He had brought food, and left Arthur a stack of DVDs to watch. Arthur could just as easily have hooked his laptop up to the flatscreen television. He could and probably would access free cable, too. But the gestures were enough. They spoke of their years together and apart; their meetings and the spaces between them.

Arthur had to count back to remember how long they had known each other. _Hundreds of years_ , he thought – which was clearly nonsense. Twelve years, in reality, as it turned out. Arthur was about a month away from his 36th birthday; Eames was 38. They'd started sleeping together, on and off, he guessed something like ten years ago. Admitted they had only started to actually like each other about five years ago. Had stopped sleeping with other people about four years ago. They had, in his estimation, a fucking colossal amount of history. And yet, they still only met up every few months or so, to work together, and occasionally to just be together.

Arthur put his keys on top of the note and took a casual look around. Not much had changed since he'd left it the last time. He'd come up here without Eames in the spring, to lie low, do a little trawling around online dream communities, and tear the carpet off the stairs. He'd hung some lights in the barn. He imagined it finished, as a workspace, but it was just a structure with a bad roof and no floor. He didn't know what to do with it. 

Eames had mounted the television on the wall and bought a new mattress, but he hadn't stripped off the old one, probably because Arthur had teased him about nests of spiders living inside. It didn't look like Eames had been here for long. Arthur wondered if he'd been hoping that they would accidentally meet up here. He wondered what Eames was hiding from at the time. Or maybe he had just wanted to come and have a look around and not be bothered.

Apart from those few small changes, the house itself looked the same: the Victorian architecture that he had fallen in love with the second that Eames had showed him this place. The winding staircase. Its utter off-the-grid-ness. The clean escape routes and hidden roads that led to and from the house. The fact that no one knew they owned it, not even Cobb. Safe as could be. Except for bears, apparently.

Arthur locked the doors and went into the kitchen where he had set down the grocery bag, which did, indeed, have some frozen pizzas in it. It wasn't that he liked them, exactly. Just that they were easy to heat up in a hurry, he never knew how long he would be staying here, and the nearest super market was 45 minutes away. 

He'd driven up here from his apartment in New York, five hours in the car, just him and his iPod. His ass hurt and his back ached and his knees felt stiff. He was hungry as hell so he put one of his pizzas in the oven and figured he would have a quick shower while it was cooking. But first he wanted to fire up his laptop just to see if he had missed anything on the internet. He set it on the kitchen table—old, plastic, and creaky, he'd eventually get around to getting an actual table—and started it. 

*PING! PING! PING!* 

Arthur turned back to his laptop, staring at the screen. It was flashing red. 

He had always known this day would come. He'd set up the computer to alert him when it started happening, and here it was.

Somewhere on the internet, people had started using the words "PASIV," "dreamshare," either "extraction" or "inception", or both, and the name, "Cobb." People occasionally posted stuff about dreamshare—dreamcades were mostly underground, but not unheard of—but Cobb's name was cause for alarm.

His work was no longer the secret it once was. 

Arthur sat down at the table and texted Cobb: _'Your name turned up in connection w dreamshare. Don't know the details yet. Could be nothing, but keep your head down. Are you ok?_ '

With that text sent, his next one was to Eames.

' _E: Any chance of meeting up to discuss something?_ '

** ** ** **

Zamalek, Cairo was swelteringly hot, hotter than Mombasa. Eames felt like both an Englishman _and_ a mad dog outside in the sun. It had to be at least 38 degrees and it was 5:45 PM. He stood under the shade of a palm tree and waited to meet the extractor who wanted to hire him. It had fucking well be worth it, for the heat alone. 

  


Truly, Eames was going to die out here and the extractor was already 45 minutes late. Not always a terrible sign of things to come, but he had a cut-off time for waiting. Maybe that time changed depending on circumstances, but he wasn't in the best of moods and it was shortening by the minute.

He was nearing the end of his cut-off time when his phone buzzed. He was surprised, as he always was, to see Arthur's name. (He assumed that Arthur was always just as surprised to see a text from him. They'd been down many roads together and would likely travel many more – and Eames mused that they would eventually end up on the same, final one – but in the meantime they tended to fall out of touch.)

' _E: Any chance of meeting up to discuss something?_ '

From Arthur, that could mean anything. ' _Business or pleasure_ ' he texted back.

He took another look around while he waited, wishing for a hat along with his sunglasses. Then he decided to go inside again, and to hell with the extractor who had told him to meet under this specific fucking palm tree. Rank amateur. Who even did that? Fucking palm tree. Fucking heat.

' _Business_ ', came the reply.

Eames texted back: ' _A job or danger?_ ' He currently wanted neither.

' _Not a job but poss. Danger, don't know yet. Don't take any work._

Eames saw a taxicab pull up, possibly with the extractor inside. He ducked back inside the cafe. He'd done his waiting; the guy had lost his chance. 

' _Arthur are you overreacting?_

Arthur's reply was quick: _Maybe don't know yet. U don't have to come here but we need to Tolkien_

Eames smiled in spite of his rotten mood. Arthur was likely either on his laptop, or talking to someone else while he texted. Eames tried to picture him in his apartment in New York, or maybe in some anonymous hotel room somewhere, frazzled and doing three things at once. Suddenly, it didn't matter to Eames if it was important enough or not. He wasn't taking the Cairo job and he had nothing else to do. He wanted to see Arthur.

He texted him back: ' _Fine where are you? I'll come._ '

' _The house_ '

Ahh. The House. Eames wanted to ask him if he'd seen the bear tracks (he knew that's what those were, and he'd also heard some creature getting up to something in the outdoors trash that night, too,) but he didn't want to keep Arthur's attention longer than necessary. He pulled up his travel app and did some quick figuring. He texted Arthur back: ' _Midnite flight, will land 6AM ish your time._

A few minutes later Arthur texted ' _U need me 2 oil you up at the airport?_ '

The image made him bark out an unexpected laugh that startled a passer-by. He wanted to answer all manner of things, but Arthur was in the middle of something and probably didn't want to be poked at. ' _Thanks, but I keep a car locked up by the airport. Will see you around noon tomorrow barring traffic._ ' And then, because he couldn't help it, he added, ' _After I have a sleep you can oil me up all you want._ '

When Arthur's text came a few minutes later and it merely read, ' _K see u then_ ', Eames knew that Arthur was multitasking and probably talking to a number of different people. Something was definitely up.

Bone-deep exhaustion settled into him and he hadn't even gotten on the plane yet.

** ** ** **

Eames had dozed a little bit on the plane, but the young man next to him constantly watching youtube videos on his iPhone without headphones on had kept him from true sleep. Who the fuck watched youtube videos for twelve hours straight? 

When he stepped outside of the airport, it was nearly as hot in New York as it had been in Cairo, and the sun wasn't even fully up yet.

He took a taxicab to the garage where he stored his New York car. Inside, he reassembled his gun. A very human dread settled into him: Morning traffic in new York City. _Fucking Hell._ All he wanted was to get upstate to the house, give Arthur a kiss and maybe a quick feel, take a shower (Arthur would have cleaned out the bathroom by now,) and go to sleep. Maybe Arthur would even have set up the new mattress and gotten rid of the old, spider-infested one.

But he was also starving, so he stopped for breakfast and then found himself passing a Home Depot store on the way up. He thought this was probably the kind of store that might sell an air conditioner that would be easy to install, so he made a stop and bought one. 

And then he bought a hammer and some nails because maybe Arthur wanted to fix something, he didn't know; and perhaps this was exhaustion-logic but possibly not. Then a screwdriver and pliers and a torch, because these were the sorts of things one needed to have in a house. It wasn't all just about groceries.

On his way back to the car, he fixated on groceries. Arthur would have bought some frozen bullshittery, and who knew how long they were going to be at the house? No, he would just have to stop at the market and buy some actual food.

So it went that it wasn't until around 1:30 in the afternoon that Eames drove up the long, overgrown drive, following the path of crushed weeds and brush that Arthur had made with his car. How different the house looked in the summer. The sun bleached its blue to the color of dust. Yet it still looked somewhat cheerful in that everything around it was so green and lush. He drove out back and parked his car behind Arthur's, both hidden from view to anyone who should wander up this way.

Which they would, of course, eventually. In the autumn, hunters would probably come roaming down this side of the mountain. _I'll hear their gunfire in the morning,_ his tired brain supplied. That was fine. No one had to know who owned the house, and their identities were forged anyway.

For now, he left the air conditioner and bags of tools inside the car, too tired to carry them in. He took the groceries he'd gotten fresh from the farmer's market on the way up. Before he could even get his key out, Arthur opened the door. For a moment, they did exactly the same thing they always did on meeting after a few months' separation. They looked. 

Eames knew he probably looked like hell, not having had a shower or a good sleep since Cairo. Arthur himself looked fairly ridiculous and inexplicably hot in nothing but boxer shorts and a faded black t shirt. Actually, he _did_ look hot. His hair hung in sweaty curls and his cheeks were flushed, but he was smiling. 

He took Eames by the front of his shirt and dragged him into the oven that was their safe house. 

"Jesus," Eames started to gripe about the heat.

But Arthur pressed his open mouth to his, swallowing any of his bitching and moaning. Eames felt something warm and sweet being crushed against his tongue. He drew back, startled at the taste and sensation. Arthur's mouth was red. Eames felt tiny seeds sticking to his teeth.

"Did you just shove a chewed raspberry into my mouth by way of greeting?" 

"I didn't chew it," Arthur said. "I just had it on my tongue."

"Oh." Eames leaned in and kissed him again, clutching his bag of groceries in one arm. The milk was cool against his side, but not for long. Arthur's hands wandered over his chest, his ribs, his back, and into his hair. 

"You look good," Arthur murmured into his mouth. "Look at you, all blond and..."

"Sun bleached it. I was in Africa."

"I see." Arthur pressed his hot self all over Eames, kissing his jaw and cupping the back of his head.

"I'm confused," Eames admitted. "You said this wasn't a sexy visit, but now you're doing sexy things to me."

"I said it wasn't primarily about sex, but that doesn't mean we can't have any."

"So we're not in immediate danger?"

"Just of dehydration." Arthur nipped at his mouth, and Eames answered by resting his hands on Arthur's hips.

He was just so tired. It was good to see Arthur, and very nice to be attacked by him in the doorway. Eames considered it for a second: Arthur, noisy and appreciative under him, or overheated and sweaty over him, both of them slick and sticky... But maybe a little _too_ sticky. He felt miserable in his hot clothes, half asleep on his feet, and clutching his groceries. "I've got milk in the sack," he announced, when Arthur allowed him to breathe.

Arthur pulled away. "What? Don't be disgusting."

Eames held up the grocery sack. "Milk. I must put it away before it spoils. And I've brought air."

"You brought _air_?"

"Yes, cool air. Conditioning." Fuck, he really was tired. "And tools. I got some tools in case we need to fix things."

"I see." Arthur looked him over clinically. "Why don't you go up and have a shower. I'll get your stuff out of your car, okay? Then you can rest a little while I set up. But after that I need your attention. Some shit is going on and you need to know about it."

"Precisely what I don't want to hear."

But Eames did exactly that, in exactly that order. After peeling out of his clothes and having a cool shower, he lay down on the too-hot couch and closed his eyes. Arthur hauled things around the house, taking things out of boxes and setting them up and being generally efficient while Eames kipped in his underclothes. Something unwound inside of him as he drifted off; something aside from the knots in his muscles and aching bones. 

When he was a bit more refreshed and the house was cooler, he put some real food on the stove while Arthur set up his laptop. 

** ** ** **

Arthur had watched the video three times already and knew it by heart. He sat at the dining room table and pulled his chair next to Eames's, angling the laptop so that they could both see it. He dragged his plate of spaghetti and glass of wine over too, so he could eat and watch. He had told Eames only a bit of the story, mostly about their possible involvement, and would let the video and the posts to the dream community tell the rest.

He clicked play. On the screen, a young woman in her 30s sat beside a little girl. They were both blond, mother and daughter. The mother looked desperate; the daughter, calm, almost serene.

Then the mother began talking, reading from notes she had in front of her.

"My name is Lauren Malick. For years there have been rumors about dreamshare, about how it's possible to go into the subconscious of other people. I'm not going to assume you all live under a rock. These rumors are true. My husband and I were involved in one of the later projects after the military developed it. All you have to do is look around. It's everywhere. Underground dream dens. You all know they exist. Denying it at this point is a waste of time.

This is my daughter, Fiona. She's only four. Yet Fiona has lived lifetimes down in the dream. My husband did this to her, yet I take responsibility. I didn't know he was doing it. The farther you go down into dreams, the longer time stretches out. He would take her into dreams for a few hours at a time. In a dream, deep down, that can equal decades. Lifetimes.

My husband is dead. They came after him when they found out that Fiona has a talent that other dreamers don't have. I can't say what it is without putting us into worse danger. This is my call for help. They are after us. The US Government killed my husband, and they're going to take her away from me. I know some of you know this is true. I'm looking for Dominic Cobb and his team. We need protection and that's why we're going public. But we need help from the best. Fiona needs help. Please contact us. I'll be screening comments and lurking. Someone please help us. Please."

She leaned forward to shut off the camera, and the screen went black. 

Arthur turned to Eames, awaiting his response.

Eames tapped his fork against his plate and stared at the screen, thinking. Finally he said, "The little girl didn't speak. She could be fairly badly off. If this is true, of course."

"Yeah, if," Arthur said. "This could be some kind of trick to get Dom to open up about what his clinic is really about. What do you think? Do you believe it?"

"Do I believe that people would take a child into limbo? Sure. People do all sorts of mad things; children aren't exempt from the insanity of adults. What we can't be sure of is if that is necessarily the case this time. They could be anyone, just gunning for Cobb. Or the rest of us, for whatever reason. What was the other secret she mentioned? Do you know?"

"I don't," Arthur said. "She plays it like she's got some other piece of information, but she's holding it back. I'm not sure if that really is for safety or if she's trying to lure someone in. But anyway, there's more."

"Is there now."

Arthur showed him the forum. Yesterday the _Lauren and Fiona_ thread had gotten up to 200 posts. Today it was 535, with more added every hour. But it wasn't necessary to read every single one just to get the idea of it. They skimmed a few of the posts.

_**SuccubusIncubus 3:37AM** – off course dream den's are real I just came back from one, still loopey from the compound... how people can not know about them is beyond me You really do live under a rock._

_**well_jung 3:40 AM** \- SI please enlighten the rest of us, if dream dens are real and your profile lists you in southern Cali. Where in southern Cali? I think the feds would close them down. Compounds? More like a crackhouse. also never heard of Dominic Cobb, who is this person?_

_**Valkyrie 3:46 AM** Google is your best friend but OK, I am in a good mood so here are some links for you. "WOMAN PLUNGES TO HER DEATH FROM HOTEL" _

_"MAN ACCUSED OF KILLING WIFE FLEES COUNTRY"_

_"WOMAN'S FREE-FALL DEATH RULED A SUICIDE, HUSBAND FREE"_

_**well_jung 3:50 AM** Wow sounds like a great guy, not. What does that have to do with dream dens? IDGI._

_**SuccubusIncubus 3:55 AM** It dosen't matter what you think, if he killed her or not, they were pioneers in dreaming. She fell into Limbo and went insane. If you never been there you don't understand._

_**well_jung 4:00 AM** We're getting off topic. HOW does this Lauren plan to find Dominic Cobb, does he lurk here, and HOW could he (or anyone) help her (and her child) If this is even true._

_**Dream_Samurai 4:02 AM** He may or may not but his team probably does, they have to keep tabs essentially. When you're performing something illegal like an extraction you need a team. Cobb's worked with the best of them and his point is legend. Nothing said about Dominic Cobb gets under his radar. *waves to Cobb's point*_

_**well_jung 4:05 AM** WTF is a point?_

_**Dream_Samurai 4:07 AM** [url='http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Take_point"]point Man[/url] Basically a military term, the point man is the first guy (or girl) in and the last one out and be the most exposed position in the field which requires almost stupid courage and loyalty. Since the dreamshare program started in the military it makes sense to think that most of Dominic Cobb's team (and his wife Mal, that was her name) would be from the military too, HOWEVER in dreamshare "taking point" means something a little different, in fact one might say that Cobb's point would be the LEAST visible team member because in dreamshare basically a point man would be more like a recon guy. He would do the prelim info gathering and probably all the cleanup (I'll be shocked if my post stays up for longer than a minute). Dreamshare is a closed community but it is also a dirty business and people disappear with alarming frequency. All that's really known about Cobb's point is that he's tall and slim and dark and rarely seen until it is too late and he's shooting you in the back of the head while he fucks your Mom and sips a martini LOL. Pretty sure I've dreamwalked with the guy but fuck if I can remember his name (not that anyone uses their real name anyway)._

_EDIT sorry I fucked up the url.  
Post edited at 4:07 AM_

_**THE_brain 4:10 AM** LOL dream_samurai. Sounds like you're talking about The Slender Man: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slender_man Does anyone seriously believe this? It's nothing more than a legend. A dreamsharing gangster / spy? He's Keyser Soze. But basically he's probably a conglomerate of about eight different people. Do you even realize what you sound like? You just described a dream archetype. Of course everyone has dreamed of this infamous "point man." That doesn't mean he exists. I notice that your post hasn't been deleted. Guess there is no dangerous, mysterious agent with his finger hovering over a delete button after all._

_**Dream_Samurai 4:15 AM** Whatever troll, you obviously don't know shit but what else did anyone expect? Yes, Cobb has/had a point man (until he went legal) and he used various others on his team too, architects and even forgers, as rare as those are. _

_**well_jung 4:17 AM** Right, what's a forger?_

_**Dream_Samurai 4:20 AM** A forger is someone who can take any form in a dream and become any person. Basically they impersonate others to gain the subject's trust or for any other reason (scaring them, whatever.) A good forger is hard to find._

_**Dreamwing 4:22 AM** I call bullshit on that last one. Who can't change to whatever they want in a dream? I do it all the time whether I'm lucid dreaming or not. Sometimes I have astral wings, sometimes I take the form of a man, sometimes I just become random other people. Everyone can do that. Raise your hand if you can._

_**Dream_Samurai 4:25 AM** Yeah sure , but could you do it well enough to convince another's subconscious that you were a completely different person? That's the key. The mind attacks all invaders. The forger has to be the most believable thing in the dream, he or she has to be realer than real and get all the details correct otherwise the dreamer's mind will go into attack mode._

_**well_jung 4:27 AM** That doesn't make any sense. Details aren't important in a dream, who even remembers them? It's all about images and WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH LAUREN / FIONA BY THE WAY? OMG it's getting too late for this and you people are insane._

_**Icarus_91 4:27 AM** I hope that Lauren and her daughter find the help that they need. I hope they are lurking on this website at least. Maybe they can find some help here._

_**Dream_Samurai 4:30 AM** LoL we are a little insane but to an experienced dreamer, details make all the difference. If you're trained to recognize when you're in a dream and when someone else is in your mind, details are the most important thing, one little fuck up and the job goes to shit. Okay long story short, no matter what he did OR DIDN'T do to his wife he is an expert in dreams and he has been into limbo, that's why L is looking for him. Maybe she thinks he can undo the damage so her kid doesn't end up like his wife, who knows. I just wish them both the best. Putting a little kid into limbo is fucked up beyond anything I've ever heard._

_**Dreamwing 4:33 AM** Wow. Just... wow. Talk about conspiracy theories. You all sound like a bunch of loonies, I thought this was just going to be about lucid dreaming. Fuck, I'm going to bed._

_**SuccubusIncubus 4:37 AM** Okay dumbass, have fun with your astral wings. *roll eyes*_

__

There were hundreds more replies, but much of the same. Arthur watched Eames with some amount of satisfaction, as he reacted to the various theories, especially when it came to the part about the forger.

Eames sat back and rubbed at his eye, thinking. "Who else knows about this fuckery? That we've worked with, I mean."

"Well, I alerted Cobb, obviously. Texted Yusuf. Saito is impossible to find unless he wants to be found, and I haven't been able to reach Ariadne. I was going to try her again tonight."

"I'd be surprised if she didn't already know about it. Who is this 'Dream Samurai' person, do you know?"

"I've got it narrowed down to about three or four mostly insignificant people."

"Well, he can't know you that well," Eames said. "Doesn't even know your name." He pushed the laptop away and went back to eating.

"This could just fizzle out," Arthur said. "Once in a while something like this pops up, but mostly people ignore and and go back to their delusions of astral wings."

"I can do wings," Eames said with a small smile.

"Kinky. How long since you worked?"

"I did one job since I last saw you. It was quick, I was under for five minutes topside, and two levels down. I don't know how I used to do so many when I was younger. One a week, it was. Surprised I didn't lose my mind."

Arthur picked the empty plates up from the table. "Who says you haven't?" he asked, smiling to offset a joke often considered tasteless in their work.

"Well, it's all subjective, isn't it?" Eames said, taking the glasses and following Arthur to the kitchen. "Somehow I managed to get myself involved with you, and here we are fixing up an old house in the woods. Which is not to say that that's the choice of an insane person. Just that it doesn't feel real sometimes."

Arthur didn't like that choice of words. No dreamwalker did, and he was slightly surprised that Eames had used them. He frowned over his shoulder and reached into his own pocket for his totem.

Eames caught his hand before he got there. "I didn't mean it like that," he said. "I'm just feeling a bit reflective, I suppose. Twenty years ago I lived in an alley behind a diner; I was eighteen and completely a lost cause. I didn't know who or what I was. Then being in the military and doing the work, the dream work, so soon after, I suppose that wasn't me, either. Forging is ninety-nine percent not being yourself. It's only recently that I'm starting to... Hmm." He trailed off, smiling. With a shrug, he turned to the sink and began cleaning the dishes.

"To know yourself?" Arthur asked.

"Yes, I suppose that's what I mean. Never too old to start, right?"

"That's right." There wasn't room at the sink for Arthur to help wash the dishes, so he sat up on the counter next to it. "And this is you? Who you are and what you want?"

Eames glanced at him with a small, close-lipped smile. "I didn't come here because I thought there was danger," he said. "There's always danger. I just wanted to see you. No, Arthur, I don't want to live in a spider-infested house in the middle of the woods, washing dishes every night before taking you to bed. At least, not yet anyway. That's too small for both of us. You know that, right? I need to be alone a lot of the time. As do you, I think. Unless I'm wrong?"

"You're not wrong," Arthur said. He wasn't sure how they had gotten into this conversation or what he had said to make Eames think he was proposing marriage or something, or asking him to move into the woods and be a hermit with him, when it had been the farthest thing from his mind. But Eames was in one of his places right now, and Arthur didn't want to stop him. It was times like this when Eames really _was_ himself and the truth poured out of him, pure and simple. 

"Then this is good for now. I am myself in precisely two conditions: alone, and alone with you. Someday I hope to see you every morning and night, and watch your lovely hair turn white and fall out, and ask you to ease my aches and pains and fetch my cane for me. Just not today."

"I wasn't asking you to stay up here with me," Arthur said. "Just to be clear. I live in the city; that's where I like it. This is just a safe house. We needed it."

"Arthur, I didn't mean..."

"But, yeah, what you said. When it's time to stop, I want to stop with you. I think that's what you meant. Stop me if I sound like an idiot."

Eames dried his hands on a paper towel, and, like he was in some kind of big hurry, turned to face him. He stood between Arthur's knees and took his face in his hands. "You don't sound like an idiot, not any more than usual, but I'm going to stop you anyway."

Eames kissed him the way he usually did: with a kind of sweet violence. Arthur grabbed his wrists and scooted closer, hooking his legs behind Eames to draw him closer.

"Let's go sit down," Eames said. "I brought a bottle of wine or two; we could kill them tonight."

 _No,_ was on the tip of Arthur's tongue. They'd always made it a point not to get drunk together, in case they should have to run, or drive, or aim and shoot. One had always stayed sober.

"Arthur, my love," Eames said, his hands still on his face, "what's the point of having a safe house if we can't feel safe in it?"

Well, there was that. 

"Come along, then," Eames said, tugging at his hands. "Get me drunk and do awful things to me."

"Since when is me blowing you awful?"

"Oh, I see," Eames said, pulling him from the counter. 

Forty five minutes later found Arthur giddy, almost dizzy, on the sofa between his favorite thighs ever, as Lord Of The Rings played in the background.

"You're my favorite, Arthur," Eames said.

Which was strange, because Arthur was just thinking 'favorite' when Eames said the word. But he was too busy to answer. He gripped onto those thighs and was amazed that he probably couldn't fit both hands around just one of them. Eames had lost probably about fifteen pounds but was still so broad and so fucking strong. He was manlier than Aragorn. And the African sun had made him so blond, not down here obviously, but his head hair. He was like a wet dream. Arthur couldn't believe he was afraid of spiders. That was the funny thing about Eames. One of the funny things about him anyway.

"Stop talking to it," Eames said, swatting at Arthur's head ineffectually. 

"Oh," Arthur answered, because he hadn't even realized that he was talking.

"And don't talk about spiders, most of all. You're making it go away."

Arthur laughed, and then he stopped laughing. Because he was pretty sure he actually _hadn't_ said that out loud. He was tipsy, maybe drunk, but nowhere near enough to lose control of his mouth like that. A brief moment of work-related panic set in: Christ, what if he really was that zotzed, and anyone could get the drop on them? _Safe house,_ he reminded himself. Where else could a man tip a few, if not in the comfort of his own joint?

Eames took Arthur's chin in his hand and tilted it up, frowning. "Arthur?"

"What?" 

"For a moment I just thought..."

Eames didn't get to finish his thought, because Arthur's phone rang.

"Stop ringing," Arthur said to it, but it didn't. Something snapped into place in his head: this is why he usually abstained. There was always business. There were no off days. Annoyed now, he left the cradle of Eames's thighs and grabbed for his phone on the table, putting the TV on mute.

Eames sighed dramatically and threw his arm over his eyes like he couldn't bear the stress of interruption. 

"Sorry," Arthur said. "It's Ariadne. Could be important." He answered, and heard her talking to someone else before he even managed a hello.

"...and return his calls before he comes looking for me," she was saying.

"Yeah, I was just about to get on the plane," Arthur said into the phone. He sat back against the couch, one of Eames's legs behind him, the other on his lap.

"Oh. Hey," Ariadne said. "Sorry it took me so long to get back to you."

"That's okay. You all right?" He scrubbed his face with the back of his hand. Everything seemed too bright now.

"I'm okay," she said. "Have you heard anything new?"

"How much do you know about?" Arthur asked.

"Just what you said in your messages and what I got off the internet. I didn't see my name anywhere."

"I didn't either, but I still wouldn't fly yet. I don't want anyone to recognize you so don't leave home, okay?"

"Arthur..."

"I mean it, Ariadne, there's no reason for you to. Just stay where you are. Stay out of airports and places where they'll have cameras."

Eames reached down and started touching himself casually, languid, waiting. Arthur felt his mouth drop open and he placed his hand on Eames's thigh. God, why did he have to go looking like that?

"I'm already here. I'm in Portland, Arthur. I left yesterday, that's why you couldn't get me."

"There's no need for you to travel," Arthur said. His hand crept higher on Eames's leg. "Wait, you're already in Portland? Why?" _That's where Cobb lives,_ his mind supplied.

"I'm staying with Cobb."

Arthur's hand stopped its journey. His mouth went dry and some strange, unpleasant feeling clenched in his ribs. Eames saw the look on his face and sat up. He looked concerned and mouthed, ' _what?_ ' at Arthur. 

"It's no big deal," she said.

"I, no... it's not. I just didn't think it was safe for you to be traveling. And actually, maybe you shouldn't be, I mean, I don't know. It's Cobb that this lady is looking for. He's got all this attention on him again and you... I don't know, I just think, I want everyone to be safe."

Eames nudged his foot, and whispered _"what?"_ again.

"Nothing," Arthur said to him, away from the phone. "Everything's fine."

"Are you with Eames?" Ariadne asked.

"Uhh, yeah. We're doing some research."

"Naked research?" 

"I don't see how my state of dress of undress is any of your concern."

"And neither is mine to you," she countered.

"What's that even supposed to mean?" Arthur asked. He went for light-hearted, but he felt slightly ill. He didn't know why. Maybe it was the idea of Ariadne in Mal's bed. In her place, beside Cobb. Except that Cobb had moved himself and the kids to a new, less ostentatious place. Portland - more privacy, less nosy people, he'd said. 

"It means I'm a big girl," she said.

"I know that. I know, I'm not saying... I mean, I'm happy if, whatever. I just don't want anyone to get hurt and it looks like people are suddenly all interested in Cobb and dreamshare and I hate when that happens. Look, don't mind me. I'm drunk."

"I had my suspicions," she said.

"Is Cobb there now?" 

"He just went into the shower."

Which, even drunk, Arthur knew was bullshit. It was only around 5 PM on the West Coast. Nope, Cobb just knew that an awkward conversation was coming and he wanted to either avoid it, or have it at a different time. Which in turn made Arthur feel like some kind of overbearing, disapproving parent, which, for fucksake he was sitting between a man's naked thighs, he didn't have the time or inclination to worry about other people's relationships, except that he was.

"Tell him I said to lie low, please," Arthur finally said. "I could get into the dream website and delete the stuff about him, but that's what they're expecting. Tell him I haven't figured out what to do about the lady and her daughter, and have him call me back and tell me what he thinks about that, if he has any ideas. Umm. I guess that's about it."

"I'll just have him call you, okay?" she said. "Like later, or tomorrow."

"Yeah, that sounds good. Right, well."

"Okay," she said, "you go and bring sexy back, and tell Eames I said hi. Talk to you later, Arthur. And, hey, one more thing."

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for having everyone's back," she said. "I know we don't say that enough. You deserve a night of drunken revelry."

He smiled at that. "It's not really revelry. We're watching Lord of the Rings."

"I'm so sure. Bye, Arthur." With that she hung up.

Eames sat up and said, "Well?"

"Ariadne's with Cobb."

"Oh. Well that's good, I suppose."

"I'm okay with it."

"Yes," Eames said. "Why wouldn't you be?"

"I feel like she expected me to react badly."

"But... Oh." Eames's eyes widened. "You mean she's _with him_ with him?"

Arthur shrugged and looked away. On the screen, Arwen was musing upon the loss of Aragorn. "I don't know," Arthur said. "That's what she made it sound like."

"Well, I guess it makes a kind of sense," Eames said, lying back against the couch again. "Cobb's still young."

Arthur glared at him. How could Eames still be lying there with his hand between his legs, waiting for Arthur to pick up where he left off... how could he still be thinking about sex while talking about Cobb?

"Did you think he would never move on?" Eames asked.

Arthur looked away, feeling like Eames had just shot him in the psyche with a nail gun.

"If you died tomorrow, Arthur, would you want me to spend the rest of my life alone? Or would you rather if I found some peace, someone to share the rest of my time with, a companion?"

"You were just telling me how you like to be alone," Arthur said. And okay, that hurt a bit, when he thought about it that way.

Eames sat up again. His broad palm cupped the side of Arthur's head, turning his face toward him. His eyes looked a little drunk, and a little sad. "I suppose that's true," he said. "I doubt I could find anyone else I could tolerate for more than a few days." He stroked his thumb over Arthur's cheek, and over his lips. "All right, so let's not use us an an example then. But Cobb is different, isn't he? He's got children. He's integrated himself back into society. He does want other people; he doesn't want to be alone."

 _Two halves of a whole,_ Arthur thought. Mal's words. Part of their wedding vows, even. 

"I see that this is challenging your romantic notion of true love," Eames said, smirking like a bastard.

Arthur pulled away from him. "That's ridiculous."

"Didn't you also lose someone you loved?" Eames challenged. "Someone you wanted for the rest of your life, obsessed over, wanted to protect forever? Someone you thought you would die without? And when she died, you went on anyway."

"I was a child," Arthur said. He really didn't want to talk about this. He never wanted to, and never would.

"Children can't love? Christ, Arthur. They feel more deeply and dramatically than adults do. If anyone loves purely, it's the young."

The beginning of a headache throbbed behind Arthur's eyes. He resisted the urge to drop his head into his hands. He felt mawkish and ridiculous even as he said, "I've never been pure, Eames."

"I'm not talking about sex."

"Neither am I." He may have been fucking around since the age of fourteen, but he didn't think that's what had ruined his innocence. It had more to do with the disappearance of a vaguely-remembered father; the occasional, half-hearted regard of a drunk mother; the violence of his peers against each other; the splatter of a boy's grey matter against concrete. And the smell of rot, which he could still recall as if it were yesterday. "I was just obsessed," he said. "That wasn't love. I was a stupid kid; possessive, angry, paranoid. I just wanted something to be mine, it didn't matter what it was."

"Still," Eames said, "you let yourself have a second chance. So is Cobb."

"You don't think they're going to end up hurting each other?"

Eames kissed the side of his head. "Sure they are. We hurt each other all the time too. It's what people do, yeah? But if you're thinking he's going to lead her into limbo and destroy her sanity, let's try to hope that he has learned not to do that anymore."

Arthur turned fully toward him, seeking his lips for a proper kiss. "I still have so many issues," he said against Eames's mouth. "I can't think of a time when I won't. Yet you seem to know everything."

Eames laughed out loud, surprised. "Jesus Christ, Arthur. We just have _different_ issues. I'm fumbling in the dark just as much as you are. It's just, I like fumbling in the dark with you."

"We could do that," Arthur said, trailing his lips over Eames's stubbled jaw. "Or we could leave the lights on. Or we could go up to the bedroom. Or all of the above."

"Did you get the mattress on the frame?" Eames sounded breathless again.

"Yeah."

"Linens on it?"

"Oh, fuck." Arthur laughed into his neck. "No sheets."

"Then we'll go into town tomorrow and buy some. And some closet linens as well, towels and such."

"Go into town?" 

"Yes, Arthur, into town. Out into the public among society. Unless you would rather spend the day on the internet, worrying about what people think of Cobb, and then drip-dry out of the shower and sleep on a bare mattress. What do you say?"

"Okay, smartass. You pick them out though."

** ** ** **

 _This is what Eames remembers. This is what he will always remember. This day, when the intense heat breaks but it's still hot enough for summer, when there's a breeze that filters down through the mountaintops into the heart of the town. The day that he feels Arthur's eyes all over him every time he turns his back. The day when he drops down, falls and falls and falls and is never quite sure where the bottom is. This is the day, he's sure of it. He's_ almost _sure that this is the day. This is the day when_

Arthur parked the car and said, "I don't know shit about linens or thread counts or what's good or bad. So this is all on you." 

Arthur was nervous; Eames could tell, without words, when he was on edge. He clearly thought he should be doing something other than spending the day out and about. He could very nearly read Arthur's mind: _Cobb was going to call him. What if something happened between now and then? What if someone came for Cobb and the kids? And, of course, Ariadne. How would he know?_

Arthur checked his phone again before getting out of the car.

"Put it down," Eames told him. "I can see your stress level rising every time you finger that thing."

"I just need to keep track..."

"Arthur."

Arthur turned to look at him. He had his serious frown on, masked with false patience; a look that said he knew he was going to get a lecture and didn't care.

"Not everything is in your control," Eames told him. "This is something you need to realize not only logically, but viscerally. On occasion, things are going to happen without your knowledge or influence."

"I know that. But at times like this..."

"There is never not going to be a time like this," Eames said. "Put the internet away, breathe, and think of linens." He smiled to offset what was essentially a scolding.

"Right," Arthur said. Eames knew it was a concession. Later tonight, he would demand to be left alone with his worries and his research. "Right, linens."

Eames got out of the car and said, "Linens... and Things?"

"Yeah. Apparently it's got other stuff aside from linens," Arthur said.

"Well, like what?"

"Things, I guess, who the fuck knows? Towels and bathroom stuff. Soap dispensers."

"Let's have a look, then."

The 'Things' part of the store, Eames noted, also sold other household necessities, as well as art prints. Most of them he found tacky ( _decals, for fucksake,_ ) but leave it to Arthur to find a gem or two. He stared for a long time at a badly framed print of Merlyn Evans's _Crucifixion 1945_ before snatching it down and walking around with it as if he'd stolen it, casting paranoid glances at everyone.

"I want to put this in the bathroom," Arthur said. "It's nice to have art to look at while you take a shit."

"Charming," Eames told him. "Let's eat lunch out by the lake today."

"What, our lake? With the bears?"

"Oh, dear," Eames said, piling linens and other necessities into the trolley and leading Arthur to the checkout. "No, pretty thing. That's a pond. The _lake._ The one in town? With the quant village where you can get lunch like a civilian and watch people waterskiing?"

Arthur frowned. "There's a lake?"

Eames closed his fingers in front of Arthur's mouth in a shushing motion and said, "Hush, pigeon. It's better if you don't speak."

"I'm going to shoot you in the foot," Arthur said. "And leave you outside at night, alive, for the bear to eat. I swear to god I'll sit inside and watch X Files while you scream."

"You'll watch Dr. Who," Eames said. "And you'll like it."

Arthur was smiling now, trying to pretend that he wasn't and still clutching his badly-framed art print. Eames could do a much better job of forging that, given some time that he did not have.

In the car, he gave Arthur directions to the spot by the lake, with the quaint village and the lunch diners. They parked a fair distance away and left their shit in the car, walking along the lakeside as they looked at different menus.

Eames was aware of eyes on him, on the both of them. When he turned his back, he felt Arthur's eyes on him, hot and dark and possessive, almost marking him. _Mine. I wrestled you down and took you apart last night._ Yes, but Eames had let Arthur wrestle him down on the hard floor, conceding defeat to the simple thrill of just allowing him. Both of them panting, half-smiling and half-serious, fighting for dominance. Eames still outweighed him by a large margin, but Arthur was quick and limber – they were evenly matched and it always came down to who was willing to let go. Last night, it had been Eames. Tonight, he would make sure it was Arthur saying "please."

He felt other eyes on him, too. People walked hand in hand or apart, families chose outdoor tables to sit at and have their afternoon tea along the lakeside, their unruly children squealing and laughing and crying. Men and women watched him; he had never been unaware of it. He was used to being watched. It wasn't because he thought he was some kind of hot shit, but because of the vaguely defined difference between him and them. He forged even when he was awake; it was a habit. And today he was forging the world-weary, hedonistic artist whose inspiration was sex, primarily with the pretty, dark-haired boy beside him. 

Arthur was hardly a boy anymore, but if Eames put out that proprietary air, it still worked. And Arthur could still pull it off.

The feeling of being watched made him feel hot and restless, exposed and desired. He stopped at an ice cream stand and ordered two soft serve cones, handing one to Arthur, who just gave him the arched-eyebrow look. _Really, Eames?_

When he was certain people were watching him, he wrapped his lips around the top of the ice cream and sucked. A girl passing by on the arm of her boyfriend craned her neck to watch him, until her fellow pulled her along.

"You're shameless," Arthur huffed.

Eames reached out and wiped a trace of vanilla from the corner of Arthur's mouth. He adjusted his sunglasses and linked his arm around Arthur's waist. Arthur, who normally pulled away from any kind of public contact ( _'It's not embarrassment, Eames; it's just not safe to show your hand like that,_ ') this time just fell into step beside him, holding his ice cream in both hands and licking it indulgently. 

_This is what he remembers, the beginning. The smells of water, roadside hot dogs, humidity. The breaking of the heat, the darkening of the sun behind damp clouds. A storm is coming._

Eames stopped walking. Arthur turned to him, frowning as he sucked down the last bit of ice cream and bit into the cone. Arthur liked the cone as well as the ice cream; Eames usually threw it away.

"What?" Arthur said. 

"Nothing. I don't know. Let's sit down." He steered them toward an empty table. The table was rattly metal and so were the chairs. 

_They scrape the ground as he pulls them out. Arthur sits down. Eames finishes the ice cream and tosses the cone into the bin as he sits._

_It's coming. It's soon._

"Eames, hey," Arthur said. "What's going on?"

He grabbed a napkin from the table, one of those cheap, flimsy ones that never quite cleaned up the sticky mess of ice cream and

 _there is a packet of ketchup underneath_.

Yes, there it was. The packet of ketchup.

"I'm having a moment of deja vu," he told Arthur. "But it's very strong."

Concerned, Arthur reached for Eames's sunglasses. The sun glared in his eyes when Arthur took them from him, making his head ache. 

"You're going to hold up your finger and tell me to follow it with my eyes," Eames said.

Arthur rolled his eyes, exasperated. "That's how we always test each other's reactions, asshole. Just do it." He moved his finger and Eames's eyes followed it. 

_Someone is watching._

He reached out with his foot under the table, stroking the outside of Arthur's ankle. Not the intimate gesture it looked like to any observer. Eames was checking for Arthur's ankle holster. The shape of it under Arthur's bluejeans reassured him.

Arthur understood exactly what he was doing. He dropped his hand and looked behind him. Then he turned back to Eames. "Someone watching us?"

"Yes." He felt sick. His head hurt.

"Eames. Who is it."

She came into view over Arthur's shoulder. She stood on the pier, a little girl of four, blond hair and blue eyes, blue shorts and a blue tank top that read "GOT MOZART?" with little musical notes around it.

That was what he saw, the beacon that burned in his memory.

_GOT MOZART?_

Why would a little girl even be wearing that? 

Arthur turned to look where Eames was looking, but it would be too late by the time he got there, to the little girl. Fiona.

The girl's mother was running after her along the pier. The girl turned to her, turned back to look at Eames, then looked to her right. Her eyes went wide. 

Arthur saw the gunman the same time Eames saw him. Arthur leapt up the same time Eames did; the metal chairs clattered to the ground and Arthur reached for his gun in the ankle holster. He wouldn't make it in time. The gunman saw Arthur reacting and he turned and

_and Arthur dies. This is why I remember today. Arthur dies._

Because there were two gunmen, not one.

Eames scrambled around the side of the table to shield Arthur, who was wide open and not moving fast enough. He heard the shot, but he and Arthur were on the ground already. Arthur hit hard, on his side; Eames actually heard his body crack against the ground, as if something had splintered under his weight. But it wasn't a bullet and that was the most important thing.

The mother, Lauren, screamed, and then other people screamed and scrambled and chaos reigned while Eames stopped to breathe. Arthur would not die.

_But Arthur always dies first. Always. Always._

Then someone was prying him away, hauling him to his feet. He felt stunned out of reality, so completely flummoxed by what had just happened. _How had he known?_ Someone was trying to drag him away. He pulled back. The water loomed behind him. 

He ducked the first blow, but the second one landed. The butt of a gun to the side of his head. He tried to call for Arthur, who was getting up, falling back down, getting up again, running toward Eames.

_Arthur, Arthur!_

His head swam; his voice didn't work. 

Another blow sent him reeling toward the lake. He vaguely felt himself hit the water, and while getting shot in the head and drowning were two different ways to die, the result was the same in the end. Before darkness swept him away, he thought,

_But Arthur lives. This time, Arthur lives._

** ** ** **


	2. 2

Arthur's time had become a fluid thing, at points seeming to stop dead in its tracks, and then speeding by. He floated on it like a tide. 

_Sounds come to him, muddled; light filters in, diffuse. Water. He's underwater. He can't breathe and he reaches out._

_Eames. In the diamonds of light, reaching back. Their hands connect, cold (_ old? _) and wrinkled. He pulls Eames up. Together they break the surface of the water, kissing in the sunlight. Arthur laughs._

_It's autumn, and Arthur stands on a porch. A big, black dog wags its tail by his side. There's a blond child, a blond young girl, a blond teenager, a blond woman coming to the door. Her age keeps shifting. The sun beats down on his hair, almost too hot. The scent of warm peaches greets him._

_From behind, Eames slips his arms around him, rests his chin on his shoulder._

_Then they're under the stars, lying on the hood of a car. It's still warm. Eames's hand is down his pants. 'Stop, someone's here, someone is watching, someone could see.'_

_Eames is young, very young, in his twenties. He's kissing Arthur in a bar in Germany. He ages slowly, or maybe rapidly. His hair stays thick but turns white; his eyes look more striking beneath it, sharper somehow. The lines around his eyes deepen; they remain even when he's not laughing. His hands curl into arthritic claws; he still smiles. Arthur thinks he's beautiful._

_Eames sits next to him on an outdoor chair. A fire crackles close to them, but it's still dark enough to see the stars. Eames takes his hand, says, 'My Arthur, you're my dream.'_

_Arthur's chest hurts. His back aches. His arm burns. He can't breathe. It hurts like hell and he's got to wake up._

_Shooting himself out is just stupid; once he realizes it he's lucid enough to tell himself to wake up, wake up, wake up, and Arthur_

woke up in a hospital chair, immediately aware of his surroundings. His chest still hurt. He had refused pain meds for his cracked ribs, knowing that they would just muddle him. He searched the darkened room with his eyes, looking for the PASIV. He checked the inside of his wrist. Nothing. No PASIV, no telltale pinprick. A natural dream then. Yet he felt that it had not been his own dream. Which, though not outside the realm of possibility, was still pretty unlikely. He was alone in the hospital room with Eames, who hadn't woken up yet.

Arthur took a breath and waited, watching Eames. The world outside continued. He could hear the television from the next room over.

_'...chaos when gunmen opened fire on a small crowd in an upstate, New York town...'_

_'...were injured but miraculously no one was killed...'_

_'...federal agents happened to be on the scene...'_

_'...one man still in critical condition...'_

He tuned it out. The car with all the shit they had bought was still parked somewhere by the lake. The safe house was still locked down, all the electricity still on, what a waste. His laptop was still charging on the desk in front of the sofa. The Lord Of The Rings DVD case would be open, the movie probably still in the player. They hadn't gotten around to shutting it off. That was about twenty four hours ago, now. Twenty four hours since he'd tussled on the floor with Eames, fighting with him for dominance, which, in the end, had been handed over to him. A tangle of sweaty limbs on the hardwood floor. How hard they had landed together, bone-jarring. 

Probably about twelve hours since they had landed on the pier, Eames taking him down hard and fast enough to crack his ribs and almost dislocate his shoulder.

Twelve hours since he'd pulled Eames out of the lake. Twelve hours since he had last opened his eyes. The bandage on his head covered up the stitches and the external swelling. His CT scan hadn't shown any brain-bleeds, but he'd been under the water for over a minute.

"Eames," Arthur said from across the darkened room. "Eames. Come on. Time to come home. Wake up, now."

First he thought it was his imagination, the muffled sound he heard. Almost like acknowledgment. He gave it a few seconds and then said again, "Eames."

It wasn't his imagination. Eames's eyelids were fluttering; he turned his head to the sound of Arthur's voice.

Arthur left the chair and sat on the side of the bed, turning on the ugly fluorescent light above them. Eames cringed at that but it didn't matter; Arthur needed to see. 

"Eames, hey. Come back." Arthur said. _You've seen worse shit than this. What's keeping you there?_

When Eames cracked his eyes open, he just stared at Arthur for a few long moments, almost suspicious. Arthur took his hand. There wasn't anyone else around to see, so he kissed the back of it. 

"Arthur," Eames rasped. 

"Yeah. I'm here."

"Am...I..." 

Eames's voice was a harsh croak, which was to be expected, but there was a strangeness to it that Arthur couldn't place. His words were slurred, as if his tongue felt too thick. Which, he guessed, also made sense. He probably had a concussion.

"Dead," Eames said. "Am. I. Dead."

The words, spoken in a halting cadence, a question posed with such surety of the answer, struck fear into him.

"Eames," he said, unfolding his fingers and pressing Eames's broad palm against his face, "I'm right here. You're here. We're both here."

"But. We. Are. Dead." It didn't actually sound like a concussion. The words felt wrong; the rhythm of them sounded like brain damage. But he'd only been without oxygen for about a minute. "You," Eames said. "My death dream. Of course."

"No, Eames."

"I lived. Without you. So many. Years." 

_Limbo, then._

Eames's eyes rolled back and for a second Arthur thought he was fading again; he gripped his hand and called, "Eames."

A harsh sound escaped him and it took Arthur a second to realize that it was a sob. Eames was crying, staring at the ceiling and the light above him.

"It was. Real."

"Hang on," Arthur said. He left Eames for a second and searched around for his drenched clothes before realizing that, of course, they were probably packed up somewhere in the hospital, along with Eames's totem. "Fuck," Arthur said under his breath. He dug into his own pocket to retrieve his die. Taking a seat on the bed again, he took Eames's hand and tried to press the die into his palm. "It's mine," he said, "but I know you know what it feels like."

Eames shoved it away. "Nonsense. Totems. I know. Not in someone else's dream. Death. My last dream. So very long."

Despair filled him. If Eames had been in limbo for that long, if he had spent a lifetime down there, then it didn't matter that Arthur had a totem and a consciousness. Eames would go the way of Mal, trying to wake up from real life.

Except that Eames wouldn't need to wake up if he already thought that his life was over. If he believed that this was some extended death-dream, his life flashing before his eyes, then there would never be any need for him to end it.

"I'm not a dream," Arthur said anyway. "I'm not a projection." _Please don't deny me like Mal did. Don't turn me into a shade._ "I know - that life was real to you. Dreams don't just feel real when we're in them. They _are_ real. If you're not lucid, then there's no difference. Eames." He pressed closer to him, gripped his hand tighter. "How do we ever know what's real? Yes, you lived that life, down there in limbo. Which I swear to you it was. But it was real to you. I know that. I get it. You lived it."

Eames met his eyes, dark and troubled, suspicious, and still wet. How the fuck was he supposed to argue with that look? Eames had spent years down there; he had experienced a lifetime that Arthur couldn't understand. All while he'd been sitting in a chair, waiting for him to come back. Eames had lived a life, gotten old, and died to wake up to this.

"Only your mind can decide what's real. I can't tell you that. All I can do is ask you to believe in me. I'm not an agent of your mind. I'm not your dying vision. Stay with me and let me convince you."

"I just wanted," Eames said. He shut his eyes tight, and, to Arthur's horror, spilled even more tears. "Just wanted. Your tie. Everything else was gone. I knew at the end. You would come for me."

Arthur wiped his own eyes. "That's fucking cheesy even for you." He smiled as he said it. He didn't know what Eames meant about his tie and still didn't like the muddled way he was talking, as if the head injury had gotten hold of his speech. He sounded like an old man. Christ, Eames was a forger. In his mind he _was_ an old man, on his last breath, stretching out the last few firings of his neurons into this endless future. What else was limbo but the dilation of time? Of course death would feel the same way. Your final breath could last for a hundred years.

"I lived without you for so long, my love," Eames said. "I didn't want to let go of you."

"You don't have to. I know that life was real to you. But this is where you are now. This is what you have."

When Eames opened his eyes, they were clear again. He looked like himself. He looked around the room, at the monitors, at the light above, as if everything had come into focus. 

Arthur waited it out. 

"It's fading," Eames said. His voice still sounded wrung out and dry. "The whole thing. _I'm_ fading."

"No you're not," Arthur said. "You're just waking up."

"Everything," Eames said. "The years. Falling away."

"Let them."

Eames took a breath, held it, then let it go in a long, weary sigh that seemed to carry the weight of a lifetime. "If it was a dream" he said, "why didn't I dream up another projection of you after you'd gone?"

"I don't know, Eames. Maybe because you have a concussion and your brain was misfiring. Maybe because you stopped breathing and without oxygen to your brain, you couldn't make sense of things. Maybe because the last thing you remembered was someone shooting at us."

Eames turned his eyes to him, sharp. "Is that when it happened? Is that when I... lost consciousness or went into limbo?" He still didn't sound convinced, but he did sound more like himself, at least. That stuttering cadence in the old man voice had gone. "It wasn't before or after that? That's when it began?"

"That's when you were last awake, yes. They opened fire on us. You covered me. They were trying to get us out of the way and you started tussling for the gun with one of them and he pistol-whipped you. The first time you shook it off. Then you got knocked out and fell into the lake."

Eames went quiet, thinking about this, remembering a long gone day. To him, it was ages ago. Arthur didn't offer any more help. It was up to him to figure out the rest. He thought that being forced to remember on his own would cement him into this reality.

"The girl and her mother," Eames said, finally.

"Yes."

"They're all right?"

"Yes."

"And are we safe?"

"I pulled the FBI / special forces shit, flipped the old ID and called in a favor. Our rooms are being guarded right now, but it won't last forever. I'm going to need you up on your feet soon. But not yet. You still have a few more tests to go. I was supposed to call them in when you woke up, but we needed to talk first. I thought you'd be confused and I wanted to tell you these things."

"Which names did you use?" Eames asked. "So I'll know what to say."

"All I had on me was my special agent Alex Goodman one. You were carrying your Jacob Hartley. The problem was that we were obviously not related. They were gonna make me leave, but I pulled the security bit, that it wasn't safe for me to leave you. The thing is that if anything had happened - if you hadn't woken up or whatever – I wouldn't have been allowed to make any decisions."

Eames just looked at him, almost expressionless, but very deeply. Either trying to discern a deeper meaning, or thinking of one himself. He hated when Eames went unreadable. Arthur got off the bed and went to sit in the chair again. He knew better than to crowd him, and he wanted away from that look. His senses were always pretty keen when it came to Eames, and now he sensed the need for space. He wanted it too.

"So," Eames finally said, looking away, "you've got some clothes for me and we can get out of here?"

"No." Arthur knew this was going to be the hard part. Playing it straight was the only way. "You're not ready to get up yet. And they still want to do another CT to check for..."

"Fucksake, Arthur."

"I called in a pretty big favor to have this room covered for a day."

"You wasted a favor."

God, Eames could be such a prick sometimes. Arthur kept his voice level and reasonable, though. "You could have died. Look Eames, just, please, get the stupid CT scan so I don't have to worry about you having a random brain bleed."

"I've had worse than this and we've never run off to hospitals and doctors and scans."

"Yes, but now we have one on hand. Just use it, all right? I'm not telling you to; I'm asking you. I didn't know when you were going to wake up, okay? I didn't even know _if_ you were gonna wake up. I didn't know if I was going to have to go back to the house and get the PASIV to go under after you. You have stitches on the side of your head; you got hit pretty hard. You were underwater, not breathing, for over a minute."

"Arthur..."

"For godsakes Eames, you're human. And it's not a waste of a favor. That's what favors are for, you cash in when you need them. How was I supposed to guess you'd be awake by now? What if you weren't?"

"Okay, shush, Arthur. Shh. Fuck. You're making my head hurt."

"That's why you should be here. You put up with my ranting without pain on a semi regular basis."

"Fine." Eames's voice was clipped. "When am I scheduled?" 

"I actually have to tell them you're awake; maybe they could go ahead and get it done now, but I still think you need some sleep, and I need some too. They're not going to let me stay in here until morning."

"Where will you go? Back to the house?"

"I can't risk being followed there. I'll sleep in the waiting room. I'm good at sleeping on chairs." He gave Eames a small smile.

Eames gave him a softer look, not exactly a smile. His eyes were still wet. "Arthur," he said, beckoning with his fingers, "come here to me."

Arthur came to stand by the side of the bed. Eames took his hand and tugged him down to sit again. He reached up and Arthur leaned forward, even though it hurt his ribs to do so. Eames slid his hand to the back of Arthur's neck and pulled him down.

"Thank you," he said against his lips. "I won't argue with you next time."

"Next time?" Arthur asked. Eames could have meant 'the next time we're in a situation like this' but Arthur felt some deeper meaning behind the words. Something ancient and lost in Eames's voice. 

"I don't want to be without you," Eames said, one hand on Arthur's jaw, the other petting over the back of his head. 

"You won't be. You're awake."

"Yes, I know." Eames pressed his lips to Arthur's forehead, oddly chaste.

It made Arthur feel uncomfortable, or too sad, something he couldn't put his finger on. As if he could feel the years that Eames had spent in limbo, years that Arthur couldn't fathom, separating them. Wanting something realer, he tilted his face up and sought Eames's mouth, kissing him like he normally did. Eames tasted of the hospital and, disturbingly, like fresh water. Arthur clutched at his forearm.

He started back when a voice at the door said, "Excuse me."

He looked over his shoulder to see a nurse staring impatiently at them, exasperated. He sighed and didn't even bother to look sheepish.

"You were supposed to call the second he woke up," the nurse said.

"I only just did," Eames said. "He woke me with a kiss, like Snow White, you know."

"God, shut up," Arthur whispered. He stood aside so she could do her nursely thing and check Eames over, poke and prod at him, check his bandages and whatever else.

"You don't look critical, but we have a protocol for brain trauma, Mr. Hartley. We'll need to get you downstairs for another scan." She turned to Arthur. "I will have to ask you to leave; it's a big process, moving a patient."

"Or I could walk," Eames said, though his voice suggested that he already knew this was not an option.

She didn't even bother responding to that.

"I"ll wait downstairs then," Arthur said, and turned to leave.

"Ar-- Alex."

Arthur turned in the door to see Eames watching him while the nurse unhooked one of his IVs on the other side. 

"Alex, there was a dog, wasn't there?"

Something tightened in Arthur's ribs; he was sure his surprise must have shows on his face.

"A black dog," Eames said. "You saw it, didn't you?"

Arthur stood in the doorway for a moment. It wouldn't be the first time they had shared a dream without the PASIV. It wasn't common, but it had happened to them before. There were other reports of it, too. 

"We'll talk about it later," Arthur said. No sense getting into it now. 

"By then we'll have forgotten," Eames said. "It will have faded, the way they do."

The nurse looked at Arthur, frowning. "What is he talking about?" She turned back to Eames, checking his eyes. "Mr. Hartley?"

"We saw something before the shooting began," Arthur said, "that's all. Details of the crime scene." He shot Eames a look that said, _Clam, if you know what's good for you._

Eames nodded. "See you later, Alex."

"Yeah, see you later." 

Arthur left the room, shaking off the remnants of the conversation. Of the entire dream he'd had before then, of which he could already remember very little. That in itself was unusual. Sometimes he did dream naturally, when he'd gone a long time without using the PASIV or compounds, but even then he was still often lucid. And even when he wasn't, he usually remembered his dreams, down to the detail. This one, though, felt hazy and light. It was very easy for him to walk out of the details of it and leave them behind. The feel of it, however, clung to him like smoke. The sense of a very long time, the late afternoon sun slanting down on him, Eames's hands on him. The scent of apples. Or had it been peaches?

Arthur shrugged it off, walking down the hall. He pulled his phone out to check the messages. There was still so much to do before he could sleep.

** ** ** **

The next morning, Eames left the hospital room in new clothes that Arthur had bought for him. An orderly had given him his own clothes, still drenched, and wrapped in a bag. Before Eames saw anyone else, he dug his hand into the pocket of his trousers, where it squelched around until his fingers landed on the poker chip. He pulled it out and flipped it in his wet hand. 

It assured him that he was not in someone else's dream. It did not assure him that he wasn't in his own. He couldn't forge, or course—he had tried, in the bathroom mirror—but if his original feeling was true, and he was, actually, living out his dying dream in limbo, then quite likely his faculties were shutting down. He might never forge again. 

And if this was so, Eames could go with it. He was adaptable. It meant that he got to be with Arthur, even an Arthur who was a projection of his dying, wishful subconscious. In the end, what did it matter? All dreams ended someday, even the one that people were pleased to call "life."

They had also retrieved his phone, which was beyond repair. He called Arthur on a land line in the hospital to ask where he was; Arthur instructed Eames to meet him in the hospital Starbucks. 

When Eames found it, he spotted Arthur immediately. He was texting on his own phone, frowning like he always did when working. Eames took a moment to just look at him. Eventually, that frown line would remain even when Arthur wasn't frowning. His hair would grey quickly once he was in his forties, and eventually would thin out. What hair he kept, he would trim neatly. His eyesight would go; he'd need bifocals all the time, but his posture would never stoop. Eames had seen it all already. And Arthur would stay with him, smiling over tea, or over his tablet, or his laptop, until the day the car wreck claimed him when he was sixty-four. 

_Not this time. Not in my dream. Not ever again._

Eames resolved that if this was, in fact, the limbo between life and death, he had some modicum of control over his fate. And he would not live without Arthur for the last twenty-plus years of his life.

But here Arthur was, young and lovely and scowling, texting hurriedly while he waited. 

_Arthur,_ he thought.

Arthur looked up, startled. He stood up, smiling past the frown.

"You're early," Arthur said, coming to greet him, but keeping a distance, as he always did in public. 

"Yes, well I could go back up for a few hours, if you'd like."

Arthur looked at him, deep and intent, as if trying to peer into his mind and see what was going on in there. Eames smiled, close-lipped, giving nothing away.

"What'd they say?" Arthur asked. "With the tests and everything." He pulled out a chair for Eames and then sat down himself. He had some scones, which he unwrapped, and two coffees, one of which he pushed toward Eames.

"My life up till now has evidently exacted its quota in brain damage already," Eames said. 

Arthur scowled at him some more.

"Nothing. Everything is fine. They gave me painkillers, which I will not take, and wouldn't let me walk out on my own. I had to sit in the chair; it was stupid. And may I just muse for a moment on the irony of having a Starbucks in a hospital specializing in stroke rehabilitation. Is caffeine supposed to help?"

Arthur smiled vaguely in acknowledgment and said, "I'm just glad you're all right. We're not quite finished yet."

"Of course not."

Arthur jerked his chin in the direction of the door at Eames's back. He turned to look. The little girl was standing in the doorway, staring at them. She was tiny, even smaller than he'd thought at first. Her blue "GOT MOZART" shirt looked stained and worn, up close. Her eyes held his, steadily and without hesitation.

"Jesus Christ," Eames said, turning back to Arthur. "That's unnerving."

"She's been doing that to me all morning. She hasn't spoken a word, though. Her mother says she's waiting to talk to both of us."

"She's... the _girl_ is waiting to talk to us, or her mother?"

"The little girl," Arthur said. "It's really weird, Eames. The way the mom talks about the kid, it's like she's in charge." Arthur nodded over Eames's shoulder again, this time in greeting. His face was stern, professional, all business. He rose from his seat.

Eames rose too. The mother looked nervous and hesitant. They were holding hands. It occurred to him that the mother was clinging to the daughter's hand, and not the other way around. They approached the table, the little girl leading.

"This is Fiona," the woman said to Eames. "Um. Hi. I'm Lauren." She held her free hand out.

Eames shook her hand, which was chilly and damp. "Yes, we saw you on the internet."

She nodded to Arthur by way of greeting, as if they'd already acknowledged each other. 

"Look, I'm really sorry you got caught in the middle of this," she went on. 

"It happens," Arthur said. "Please, have a seat."

Lauren looked to her daughter, who nodded briefly. Then she pulled two empty chairs from a nearby table. "I'm going to get a coffee. I'll let the three of you..." She waved her hand helplessly before flitting off.

Eames thought it couldn't get any stranger, until Fiona spoke.

"Now that we're all seated," she said, "and I hope we're all comfortable, we can discuss these events." She turned her grave eyes on Eames. "I'm very sorry for your injuries. I accept responsibility and I feel I owe you, but unfortunately I have yet more to ask of you."

"I'm sorry," Eames said, "but how old are you?"

She gave him a small, sad smile. "I'm four. But please try to bear in mind that I have lived for many years. I'm sure you understand."

"Forgive me, but I don't," Eames said. He'd been to limbo, too—was likely in it now, again—and it hadn't changed him this profoundly.

Lauren returned with a cup of coffee for herself, and tea for her daughter. She also brought back two chocolate chip cookies.

"I just can't give them up," Fiona said, reaching for one. "Even as an old woman I enjoyed them."

Eames looked from Arthur to Lauren. He was certain that his face conveyed the sense of 'what the everloving fuck' that he felt.

"My father was a genius," Fiona said. When her mother seemed likely to interrupt, she held up one hand, polite but firm. "Let's not debate that; he was. He had books, volumes, libraries, stored in his mind. He had an eidetic memory, you see. We would go into the dream for days, in real-time. Lifetimes in limbo. He taught me everything, played music until I could play it myself. Read to me by rote until I knew everything he knew. Plays, novels, Shakespeare. Books on physics, space and time, quantum." 

"Just because your father memorized it," Arthur said, "doesn't mean that you could have. The dreams will fade. The knowledge will fade."

"I have an eidetic memory, too," she said.

Ah. Well that changed things.

"So I lived," she went on. "And lived, and lived, and lived. I grew up, grew old. Many times. If you're wondering what my experiences were down there, then wonder no more. They were the experiences of any adult."

She let that sink in, while Arthur and Eames glanced at each other, trying to fathom what she meant. _How much_ she meant. It was Eames who finally asked.

"What, like responsibility, work, illness? Or are you talking of love, marriage, children?"

"Everything," she said. 

"They were projections," Arthur said. "Whoever you experienced your life with. Projections."

"My own projections," Fiona supplied. "But they were real to me. Aren't we all projections anyway? Walking projections of other people's consciousness? Aren't we just what everyone else sees?"

"No," Eames said, the same time that Arthur said it.

"We're autonomous beings," Arthur went on, while Eames said, "We're more than the sum of perception."

"You can't experience adulthood when you're only dealing with your own psyche," Arthur said. "You don't have the same interactions with real people that you have with yourself. Other consciousnesses exist outside of yours." He glanced at Eames as he said this, as if he could sense that Eames was still unsure of his own reality. As if it mattered anymore. "You can't deny them," he said. "They're realer than dreams. There's a definite line."

She looked from one to the other, smiling vaguely. "How can you be so sure?"

"Because I've been doing this for years," Arthur said. "And because I knew a woman who thought like you, once."

"Mal," Fiona said. "I know about her, yes. I'm talking about something different. I'm not trying to wake up from limbo. I know exactly where I am and what my reality is. I'm not confused."

"Right," Eames said. "So then what is it you want?" He was very sorry for the girl, and also her silent, fretting mother. But this tragedy—for that's what she was—had nothing to do with him.

"And how did you even find us?" Arthur asked. "You tracked us down. I'm going to need to know how, before anything else."

"And here we come to the crux of the matter," she said. She picked up her cookie in her tiny hands and nibbled at it, then wiped crumbs off her lips before answering. She didn't fidget. It was only then that Eames realized she wasn't even in a child's seat; she was kneeling in the chair. "I tracked you down through your dreams," she said. "It's not hard. I don't need a PASIV to get into other people's minds. It's part of why I'm in such danger. Because I can do things like that."

"Remote dreamshare?" Eames said. "Is that what you're getting at?"

"Yes," she said. "And I know you've been party to experiments involving remote dreamshare, so I've no doubt you believe me. I found where you were while you were asleep. Or altered, at any rate. You were drunk."

Arthur's mouth tightened and he glared, or tried to, at Fiona. At the same time, a blush tinged his cheeks. 

_Of course,_ Eames thought, _two nights ago. We were hearing each other's thoughts. That was her._ That had begun to happen when they were both naked and writhing on the sofa. He made it a point not to look at Arthur. Or at anyone.

"So you see why I'm so dangerous," she said. "I'm a human PASIV."

"If you didn't use that power in the first place," Arthur said, "then they wouldn't know about you and it wouldn't be a problem."

"I can't just shut it off," she said. "I want to. That's one thing. And there's another thing I want, too."

"What might that be?" Eames asked.

For the first time in the conversation, Fiona looked to her mother. Lauren covered Fiona's tiny hand with her own.

"I want my childhood back," Fiona said. "I want to forget that I was in limbo. And for that, I need safe passage to Dominic Cobb and his dream institute."

"If Cobb says no?" Arthur asked.

"He won't," Fiona said. "So let's not even bother entertaining that idea."

 _All we wanted,_ Eames thought, _was a little time on our terms._ He desperately wanted Arthur to stand up, say, ' _I'm sorry, I can't help you,_ ' and walk away. They were in a hospital, for fucksake. Eames was tired of getting shot at. But Arthur just stared into his coffee cup, considering. 

"Don't fight about this," Fiona said. "I need you both to agree. It will make it easier for all of us to travel together, and you two work best together when you're getting along."

"Don't you dare assume..." Eames began, angry, because how dare this little child tell him how to behave, how to feel, and most of all, what he was going to do.

"We can't afford to let you say no," Lauren said in her quiet, apologetic voice. "We know where you live."

Arthur glared at her. "You had me until just now." He began to get up, eyes blazing. "Eames, come on."

 _Yes._ There was his Arthur, the man on fire, the man you didn't fuck with.

"Where will you go?" Fiona asked. "Back to your compromised safe house? We'd follow you. _They'd_ follow you, the people who are after us."

It was on the tip of Eames's tongue to say _'fuck off,'_ but it was impossible to say to a four year old girl, no matter how many lifetimes she thought she'd lived. He just gave her what he was certain was a disapproving, adult look as he stood up.

"Don't go," Lauren said. "They'll kill us. _Please._ We shouldn't have threatened you; it was a last resort. Okay, I'm sorry. We didn't have a choice." She grabbed Arthur's hand. A few patrons started looking in their direction. "At least take her. Take her to Cobb, I'll stay behind, please."

"Stop it, stop it," Arthur was muttering, pulling his hand back.

"Back off," Eames told her, in his lowest voice, the one that worked on everyone. Lauren wasn't an exception. She let go of Arthur's hand and shrank back from both of them.

"Mom," Fiona said, "it's all right. Let them go." She slid off her chair and walked to Eames. She was about the height of his thigh, so tiny, so thin and grimy. She sounded so old. "You'll help us," she said. "You'll do it. Not because we made you do it, either. But because you have to. Because that's how it happens. You know this, Mr. Eames."

Confused, and with a creeping sense of dread, he looked to Arthur for some sort of sign. Arthur just looked as dazed as he did, and as flummoxed.

He also looked guilty. Like a man shirking what he knew was his duty.

 _Well, fuck,_ Eames thought.

** ** ** **

Arthur made a few phone calls as the four of them shared a taxicab back to the lake. Eames hardly knew what they were going to do from there. Arthur spoke to no one aside from the people on the phone, and even then he answered in one-word replies and assents.

"Fine. Yes. Understood. Thank you. No, don't be sorry. Yes. Yes. Will do. Thanks again."

He was silent until they exited the cab and stood on the boardwalk, where it had all begun the day before. A few police cars still stood parked around the lake. A handful of people were taking photos on their phones, chattering excitedly about what had happened. Yellow police tape crossed the pier where Eames had fallen off.

Arthur looked at the water, tense and miserable. Fiona and Lauren stood side by side, silent. Lauren seemed unsure of where to look.

"Arthur," Eames said, wrapping a hand around his elbow. "A word, please."

"Sure."

He pulled Arthur away from Lauren and Fiona, into the shade of a tree. He turned his head away from most of the crowd, hoping they wouldn't catch a glimpse of the bandage on the side of his head and do the math.

Arthur met his eyes steadily, but his voice shook when he spoke. "I have to go back to the house and shut the genny before I go," he said. "And I don't think you should go back there for a while. They'll be watching us."

"The feds, or the people who are chasing this girl?"

"No, not the feds; they're out of this. They were only there because I called in that favor. Officially, I don't exist, so they can't afford to offer me any more protection. This is out of their jurisdiction unless the mother turns them both over into protective custody, and I can tell you right now that's not going to happen because they won't be able to help her. They don't know anything about the dreamshare, officially."

"So then, what?" Eames said. "We're taking them to Cobb? That's your decision?"

Arthur's eyes flashed. "I can't do anything else, Eames. I'm not asking you to come with me. Stay stateside, don't fly anywhere, but lie low."

"Oh, fuck you, Arthur. Don't play the martyr and act as if you've got to do this alone."

"And don't you act like I'm dragging you into it," Arthur said. "I know you don't want to do this. I don't want to either, escort missions are bullshit and I hate being coerced into jobs."

"No one is coercing you. They're powerless against you; you know that. It was a stupid bluff. Without your protection they wouldn't make it out of the state, so don't insult any of us by acting like you're being forced to do this. You're making a decision."

"And it's one you don't have to agree on," Arthur said. 

Eames felt a flare of anger bubble up in his chest. "Because I make a habit of leaving you to handle situations by yourself, hmm?"

"We both do jobs alone all the time, why is this a big deal? I know you don't want to do it and I really don't want the guilt of feeling like I dragged you across the country, especially after this."

"Oh, do I always make you feel guilty when we work together on shitty jobs?"

"Oh my god, Eames, _stop_ ," Arthur said. His hands clenched into fists by his sides and he looked away, toward the water again, before quickly looking in the opposite direction. "I'm just saying you don't have to go. No one is forcing you."

"No one's forcing you, either." He didn't know why he felt the need to keep defending this. He couldn't get a handle on his own anger, and apparently neither could Arthur.

"She's four, what am I supposed to do?"

Eames wanted to make all kinds of angry replies about Arthur playing the hero, being a doormat, not understanding the difference between being helpful and being used, just like when he was with Cobb – because he knew that would hurt the most. Instead, he wrestled with himself for control. It had been such a long two days. His head hurt, he was hot and exhausted. He wanted to scold Arthur and make him feel bad, and he wanted Arthur to do the same to him. That happened sometimes, and when it did, it spiraled out of either of their control too quickly. He took a breath and pressed his lips together, trying to repair his brain-mouth filter, which seemed eroded by too much emotion.

Arthur kept glancing at the water and then away from it, looking back at Eames for his reply. His jaw was tense, teeth locked together, and with that worried crease between his eyebrows. Not anger, just fretfulness. 

"Who pulled me out of the water?" Eames asked.

Arthur's shoulders dropped and the wall came down. He didn't answer. 

Eames glanced around to make sure no one was looking their way when he reached out and cupped the side of Arthur's neck. He wanted more than that. He wanted to crush him, press his face into Arthur's neck, and brand 'I'm sorry' all over him. But the brief touch was all he could afford.

"We'll both take them," Eames said. "There's no other way."

Arthur lowered his head fractionally. "I already know you're not happy about it. Don't let it fuck anything up and remember that I'm not happy about it either."

He briefly ran his thumb across Arthur's bottom lip before withdrawing his hand. And that would have to suffice to convey his apology, and the fleeting, oppressive feeling of absolute devotion that sometimes sucked him under like the riptide.

"I have to go back to the house to shut everything off before anything else," Arthur said. "And I need my laptop. I need you to stay here, watch them, and keep everyone else off my back while I go."

"If they tail you?"

"I'll shake them. I want that house, Eames."

"I wasn't worried about the house. We can get another. I was worried about you, you twat."

"I can handle it." 

Eames dropped his hand. "So, what, I play child-minder to these two and wait on your return, and then we hop into a merry caravan and make our way cross country?"

Arthur looked away, trying for a wry smile, and falling short. "Yeah. Exciting, huh? Anyway. I'll be back in two, three hours tops and then we can go."

"Well, excellent, I'm so good at amusing people." 

"You don't have to amuse them. You don't even have to be cordial. Just make sure no one shoots them. And for godsake, don't you get shot either."

"Yes, I got that part, Arthur."

"Right. I'm gonna just take your car, then."

Eames thought of everything in it, all the stupid fucking linens and Arthur's painting that he wanted to put into the bathroom. Eames was always honest with himself, no matter how painful. Part of him, he now saw, had panicked about the idea of buying linens with anyone, and would honestly rather take off to the other side of the country, dodging bullets. Yet another part felt cheated that they'd gotten sucked into this drama instead of putting the linens on the bed and hanging the painting. He wanted to run across the countryside, sometimes without Arthur. He wanted Arthur. He wanted both things, and in the end it didn't matter, because it would play out the way it played out. 

It was all but a dream, anyway.

** ** ** **

Arthur drove down the winding roads. As he neared the hidden road to the house, a red pickup truck came up behind him. It didn't look like the kind of car that would tail someone, but then, people had gotten trickier than this with him in the past. 

He pulled over. Sometimes confrontation was enough to shake a tail. The truck pulled up behind him. Again, Arthur pulled the gun from his ankle holster and shoved it into the back of his pants. He got out of the car. 

An elderly man hopped down from the pickup and approached.

"Hey there," he said. He took off his beaten, denim baseball cap and ran his hand over his thinning white hair. "You lost?"

"Me?" Arthur said. "No. Just, uhh, pulled over to make a call." He kept one hand on his hip, ready to reach for the Glock.

"You from these parts?" The man looked suspicious of him. That was a good sign.

"No, just came up to see the lake. Then all that crazy stuff happened. I'm just checking in with my family to tell them I'm okay." Arthur gave his best harmless smile. He was pretty good at that one.

"Yeah, ain't that some shit?" the man said. "You live your whole life up here to get away from guns, except hunting guns of course. Wish people'd keep their crazy ways downstate where it belongs." He still eyed Arthur carefully, as if he somehow knew that the city boy been involved. 

Arthur took a second to decide which hand to play. It was going to get out anyway, eventually. He took out his fake ID and flipped it open. "Alex Goodman," he said, holding out his free hand.

"Oh, I see," the man said. He shook Arthur's hand, smiling now. "Jacob Riley, Riley's Farm Stand up the road there."

"Oh yeah, I saw your stand before." _And Eames bought a ton of produce,_ he did not add. "We're just trying to clean this up, and see if anyone has any information on the shootings."

"I don't know about that," Jacob Riley said. "Something big going on up here? I mean... _feds_."

"I hope not, Mr. Riley," Arthur said. "We're going to do all we can to find out who is responsible, and why."

And that, at least, was the truth. He really did want to put a stop to this. And it wasn't for the little kid or her mother, or the stupid jackass of a father who had ruined his daughter's childhood.

It was because these people, whoever they were, had come into this small town that Arthur actually liked, and shot it up. They'd caused mayhem at that little lake, scared the shit out of everyone, and knocked Eames into the water, where he had nearly died. Arthur held them personally responsible for the slurred, halting way Eames had been speaking when he'd woken up. For his distant eyes, and the brand new uncertainty when he looked at Arthur. When he looked at anything.

"I'm gonna find them," he said, more to himself than to Mr. Riley.

"I sure hope so."

Arthur shook his hand again, thanked him for pulling over, and got back into the car. He waited for him to pass before driving off again. The house was going to remain his secret, at any cost.

He drove up, pulled into the back, and dialed Cobb as soon as he shut the ignition.

He knew that Cobb and Ariadne had probably heard about the shootout, but neither of them knew that he and Eames were there. Still, he owed Cobb a call, and calling him was as good as calling Ariadne. 

He picked up on the first ring. "Dom Cobb."

"Hey, it's Arthur."

"Jesus Christ," Cobb said. "What's going on up there?"

"How do you know where I am?"

"Ariadne triangulated your last call. What the hell are you two doing in upstate New York?"

"It's – nothing. We're working. We didn't want anyone... I just didn't want to be disturbed up here, I thought I could find a..." He broke off, disappointed and frustrated. It didn't matter who had done it. He hadn't wanted anyone to know where the house was.

"I need to know if you're okay," Cobb said. "The news said no fatalities?"

"No. No fatalities."

"But they pulled a man out of the water."

"Eames," Arthur said. _I pulled him out, Cobb. I pulled him out and he wasn't breathing and I thought that was it, he was dead. I thought I'd end up like you._ "He's okay," he added.

"Jesus, Arthur. And the gunmen got away?"

"Yes."

Cobb sighed. "Was this connected to the kid and her mother?" He stated it like a conclusion rather than a question.

"Yes. I met them at the hospital."

"The hospital?"

"Yeah. We needed the federal presence and Eames had to have a CT scan. He has a concussion, and... Well, it was a long time that he was under. Limbo, I mean."

"Shit."

"He's okay," Arthur repeated. Insisted, really.

"Arthur, you have to know that people come out of limbo all the time, and eventually they're all right. Me, for instance, although maybe I'm not the best example. Saito, on the Fischer job. He rebounded pretty quickly. Eames, you know, he's a professional, he'll..."

"Yeah, I know," Arthur said. 

Cobb sighed again; Arthur could picture him scrubbing his fingers over his hair, scratching his scalp thoughtfully; his worried habit.

"The gunmen were after the little girl," Arthur said. "She can remote dreamshare."

"Without any implants?" Cobb asked, immediately interested.

"I don't know. Her father ran dream experiments on her but I don't know what else he did to her. They want to see you. They want us to bring them there."

"Can you?"

Arthur scrubbed the back of his hand over his eyes. "If we have to. If you want us to. Yeah, we can get them to you in one piece."

"I'd like to try to help them. No guarantees, but I could try. Remote dreamsharing, huh? And is that all?"

"No. But it's not for me to tell you."

"Okay. Listen, Arthur. If you're going to do this, just be careful, all right? That kind of technology doesn't even have a price. I don't know if they want her alive, or if they just want her out of the way. Whoever 'they' are."

"This is going to put you in danger, too."

"Not once she's here," Cobb said. "Security is pretty good at the institute."

"But outside of it? Cobb, watch your back. They already know we're coming to you."

"Security is pretty good around me, too," Cobb said, with half a laugh. "Listen, let me get in touch with Saito; he funds the institute. Hang tight for a day; maybe I could get you all on a plane." 

"I don't know if they're going to give us that long, Cobb. I don't even know who these people are. We can't stay in one place; we'll be moving around, making our way over there."

"I understand. I'll see what I can do. And hey, take care of yourself, you sound like hell. And, uhh. I hope Eames is... I hope he's okay. Or better, soon. You let me know if you need anything else, okay?"

"Yeah. Thanks, Cobb. I will."

"Get some rest," Cobb said, and hung up before Arthur could tell him goodbye.

Arthur shut down his phone and started unpacking the car.

** ** ** **

Eames asked Lauren how they'd gotten there and where she'd parked her car. A few miles away from the lake, it turned out. 

"It's a rental," she said. "We didn't have time to pack a lot of things, so we don't have much luggage. There's room for four."

"Lead me to it," Eames said. 

His sunglasses had been ruined the day before. It felt like the sun was stabbing through his eyeballs into his brain. His head throbbed in time with his pulse. He was fucking exhausted and in a foul mood. He wanted to go into a parking lot at night with Arthur and spar with him for an hour. That always made him feel better. But Arthur was up at the house, gathering up his shit and locking everything down, and Eames had been saddled with these two. 

Before they left the lakeside, he pulled Lauren and Fiona aside, towards a little merchant stall, and bought a pair of sunglasses. 

"Does anyone want a bottle of water?" he asked. He was thirsty, and he had to imagine that they were, too. As put-out as he was about having to do this, he wasn't going to be too much of a tit over it. There was no need to be petty, at least.

"Let me get it for you, Mr. Eames," Lauren said. "Please let us buy you lunch, at least."

"With what?" he asked, handing over far too much American money for glasses and bottled water. "Did you two bring your life savings with you before you ran? Got a lot of cash on you, do you?" All right, so maybe he would be a _bit_ of a tit.

Lauren looked ashamed. "I've got a bit of cash," she said. "Actually I need to stop at an ATM."

"Oh, yes," Eames said. "That's exactly what you want to do. Use your card so that they can trace it and follow you across the country. Surely you must know how bad an idea that is. Don't you even watch the telly?"

"We're not criminals," Fiona said.

"Well now you're traveling with two of them, so you had better get used to thinking like the rest of us lowlives."

"I didn't mean it like that," Fiona said.

"No, of course not. Because for as much as you like to convince yourself that you've lived many lifetimes and are wise, you are still a child. Memorizing Shakespeare and having lengthy dreams about life does not make one an adult."

"Mr. Eames," Lauren said, this time with anger in her voice. "You can't talk to my..."

"Yes, I can," Eames said. He stepped up to Lauren and looked her in the eye. They were blue, like her daughter's. "And you should be thankful that she still doesn't know any better. Children are meant to say rude, unthinking things."

She didn't answer. Eames handed them each a bottle of water and ripped the tags off his new sunglasses before jamming them onto his face. He liked his old ones better; these were cheap and shitty.

"Take me to your car," he said. 

They led the way, not holding hands but walking side by side in front of him. He felt sad as he watched them, because clearly they no longer knew how to relate to each other. They were outsiders to one another, even more than he was.

They walked along the lake for about an hour, before turning north onto a tree-lined road. Cicadas hummed and clicked. The sun climbed until it was overhead. Eames thought about Cobb, on the west coast, and tried to form a map in his head of how they would get there. The day seemed so calm and quiet, it was hard to imagine anyone with violent intent. Or, perhaps, he thought, it would be hard for anyone else to imagine it. Eames knew better. Violence didn't wait until dark and stormy nights. Trouble didn't postpone itself because of beautiful, quiet days. Death didn't happen in the dark; it happened under the sun, while the birds went on singing. Cars got broadsided at intersections on random Thursday afternoons, no matter if you were a hundred years old and ready to die, or sixty-four and on your way home with take-out and a bottle of wine.

And he was a morbid bastard; he knew that.

Was he? Or was he just a crotchety old man, dying in an assisted-living home somewhere? _It doesn't matter_ , he reminded himself. _I can feel the sun on my face, the ground under my feet. I can smell the air and hear cicadas and taste the plastic-bottled water._ He was a creature filtering reality through all of his senses. What else was there?

"We put the car behind some high bushes," Lauren said. "We didn't know how far they would go to get us, so we tried to hide the car."

"Let me know when we're close to it," Eames said. He glanced at his watch. It was 12:37. Arthur should be along soon. 

On they walked, until they came to a place where the bushes grew higher along the side of the road. Fresh tire-tracks marked out an old, dirt path. Eames could see the car from where he was standing. He fought not to roll his eyes. It really wasn't their fault that they were shit at hiding.

Someone else had been to her car. He already knew how this was going to end up. The knowledge didn't come through observation or experience. It came, again, through that sickly, nauseous feeling of deja vu. 

"Right. Back away and hand me the keys."

"Are you going to..."

"Do as you're told," Eames said. 

Lauren dug through her purse and held out the set of keys. Her hand was dry, the skin cracked. The nail of her forefinger was torn down to the quick. Briefly, he imagined their initial flight: running from the murder of the man who had put them into this situation, without even enough time to pack a bag. Lauren had her phone, credit cards, and a small amount of cash; Fiona, the clothes on her back. That stained, blue t-shirt. GOT MOZART? He felt a wave of pity for them. 

"Right," he said. "Let's back up a handful of paces. Is this a remote ignition starter?"

"No. Why? Oh my god. Do you think... No." Lauren shook her head. "No." 

"You think it can't have gone far enough for them to set a car bomb? They killed your husband. Does the car unlock when the keys get close to it?"

"Yes," she said. 

"Then back up."

She swept Fiona up in her arms and together the three of them backtracked a few meters. Lauren covered Fiona's head with her arms.

Eames threw the set of keys as far as he could down the path. He heard the click before it went off. The explosion was a small one; it didn't even reach them. Typical IED, small range.

Neither of them screamed. Eames watched the flames rise and fall beyond the overgrown brush, and sighed. The acrid smell, on a wave of heat, finally reached them.

"Come on," he said. "Let's move. They're going to come along and see that your bodies aren't lying there."

Lauren looked up at him with wet, terrified eyes. And Fiona, finally, seemed to grasp it: Real life. Not limbo. Real death. If her father hadn't ended her childhood at four years old, this would. She stared at him in shock.

"Come on," he said, gently. "Let's go." 

"What do we... where do we go?" Fiona asked in a small voice.

"We meet up with Arthur, and we move out of here."

"They want to kill me," Fiona said. "They want to kill me, I'm only four and then want to kill me."

"Yes."

"But that's not fair."

"No."

"None of this is _fair!_ " She sounded petulant, like the child that she was. 

"No. Now come on. Shift."

Fiona reached out to him, from her mother's arms. He stood, for a moment out of his depth, more frightened of the child than the burning car. Her little hands insisted, and finally he took them. She went to him and wrapped her arms around his neck, trembling. 

"All right, hush," he said. 

She sobbed like the baby that she was, pressing her face into his neck and clinging like he was her best uncle and her birthday party had gone horribly wrong and no one else understood. Her arms crushed him under the weight of responsibility. He hated it.


	3. 3

Arthur pulled the car into the motel parking lot. It was midnight and he couldn't go any farther without putting everyone in danger. Eames had fallen asleep beside him. Fiona had dropped off hours ago, and Lauren now slept with her head tilted back against the seat, her phone in her lap.

They had made it as far as the edge of Pennsylvania, stopping for dinner once, and to use the bathroom twice. Before leaving New York they had stopped at a flea market, where they blended in as much as possible. Eames had stayed behind to watch the car. Arthur had bought a set of clothes for Lauren and Fiona, and a second-hand carseat. Lauren made a token protest, but Eames had already laid down the rules about not using her credit or debit card. Then Arthur bought a switchblade and some ninja throwing stars, for the hell of it. He wondered, walking around with them, if they looked like some kind of strange family.

Each time they'd stopped to rest, it had been a big production. Who got what, what sort of toothpaste, Fiona was allergic to gluten and dairy; on and on it went. If it had been just him and Eames, they'd be halfway across the country by now.

Eames stretched and yawned beside him, blinking in the flickering light of the motel sign. Arthur turned on the overhead light and took an oblique glance at him. He looked pale and tired, but present. 

"How's your head?" Arthur murmured, quiet and private.

"Fine," Eames said. 

"I have some water left if you want it."

"I'm all right, thanks."

In the back seat, Fiona and Lauren stirred and stretched, looking dazed. 

"Are we stopping for the night?" Lauren asked.

"Yeah. I want you guys to stay in the car with Mr. Eames while I go check us in. Okay?"

"Do you think we were followed?" Fiona asked, sleepy and muddled.

"I don't know. That's why I don't want you to get out and roam around. Let me get the rooms first, then we'll pull around and make a plan for the night."

"The usual?" Eames asked.

"Yeah." The usual was a room on the ground floor, and the two of them taking turns standing guard, usually three hour shifts.

Fiona began unbuckling herself from her carseat while Arthur got out to head to the front desk.

Adjoining rooms on the ground floor, he insisted, showing his false ID. They were quick to oblige him. He got four more bottles of water from a vending machine, and went back to the car.

"I want you both to have your go-bags ready," he told them, as he started the car to drive around to their rooms. "Don't unpack. Take out what you need to shower—which you will do quickly—and then pack it back up. If you have to have the television on, leave it turned down as low as you can. I need to be able to hear you if you call for me. One of us will be in the adjoining room. You can close the door if you need to; we don't want to intrude on your privacy. The other will be outside the door in the car, keeping watch. We'll take it in shifts."

"Can we sleep?" Lauren asked.

"Yes, if you can."

He parked the car directly in front of Lauren and Fiona's room. The night air was heavy with humidity; moths fluttered haplessly around the parking lot lights. An ice machine hummed and shuddered at the end of the outdoor hall. It was exactly like any other motel he'd stayed at, in any other part of America. 

He turned to Eames. "I'll take first watch, three hours, okay? You check the room for them, have a shower, and get some rest."

"You must promise me you'll get some sleep on my watch," Eames said. "You'll be driving tomorrow."

"I can drive for a while," Lauren said.

"I'd appreciate that," Arthur said. And that being the case, he would take a longer watch. He just wouldn't tell Eames about it.

"Be sure to wake me in three hours," Eames insisted. 

_Can you still hear me thinking?_ Arthur thought. He was just tired enough. He wanted to glance over the seat at Fiona, see if she was up to her remote dreamsharing trick.

No answer came. He guessed, in that case, that Eames just knew him too well by then.

"Sure," Arthur told him, looking away.

Eames snorted and shook his head. "Right," he said to Fiona and Lauren. "Let's get you all situated then." He gave Arthur's leg a friendly squeeze before getting out of the car.

Once he was alone, Arthur climbed into the back seat. There was more room back there to stretch his legs. He locked the doors, cracked the window, and opened his laptop. This wasn't a stake-out; he didn't have to watch every door. He just had to make sure no one tried to get past him or plant a car-bomb.

His laptop blared its alarm again, and he hurried to shut the sound and then disable it. He already knew that the word was out about...well, probably all of them. Nothing he could do now but damage control, and that would have to wait. He went to the dream forum again. 

It showed a new thread, already with hundreds of replies:

**SHOOTOUT IN NY!!**

At the top of the thread, he saw why: a hastily-recorded video on Youtube, of Lauren, taken with her phone and uploaded yesterday. She was walking as she recorded herself.

_"We're in upstate New York, Fiona and I. Look, I know this puts us in danger, me saying where we are. But I hope that the people we're looking for will see this message and will help us before anything bad happens. If something does happen, you know why. Someone has to take us seriously. We need help. Please, we need help."_

"Fuck," Arthur said. He replayed it. The background, from what he could see, was the tree-lined road where she had parked her car. That meant it had been just over an hour before it had all gone down on the pier. It also meant that the people gunning for them hadn't been directly on top of them, otherwise they would have taken them out right there, in the deserted road. Instead, they'd caught up later, at the pier. And as a safety net, had set the car-bomb.

But that was before. Now, it could go two ways: the publicity would either make these people more cautious, or it would make them more desperate and reckless. He hoped for caution. Caution would buy them time.

He rang Eames up on the phone.

"Missing me already?" Eames said.

"Tell them no more fucking videos," Arthur said. "She did one right before the pier. I'm pretty sure these people have a trace on her phone, and even if they didn't, it's just really foolish and dangerous."

Eames sighed, as if silently asking to be given patience. "I'll tell them," he said. "See you in three hours, Arthur. I'm setting my alarm, so don't get any ideas."

"Set it to five," Arthur said. "I need to get some work done. On the internet"

"Bullshit."

"Five hours, Eames. I'll sleep in the car tomorrow." 

"You're a bastard."

"For making you sleep, yes, I know. How can you stand it? Come on now, give me some time alone with my true love."

"I will fight the internet for you, Arthur. The whole internet."

"You're delusional. Go to sleep." Arthur disconnected before Eames could argue. 

Then he started reading the thread.

 

_  
**SuccubusIncubus 1:58 PM** Okay, HOLY SHIT. Now does everyone believe them?_

_**Dream_Samurai 2:00 PM** So not surprised. Look, it's clear that they these people are deadly serious. They not only want to capture them but this looks like an actual HIT. The question is what can we do to help? If I can find anything about about WHO these people might be I will post all my info. I'm not afraid either. OK now here is another weird thing. Read some of the articles about this. They say there were two men there, one fell into the river and got pulled out.... said they were federal agents. Who do we think they were really?_

_**Dreamwing 2:06 PM** Oh my God, those poor people. No fatalities, thank the Gods! I will send them all my prayers. Namaste!_

_**Dream_Samurai 2:08 PM** Oh yeah, prayers will help. I hear those can stop bullets /sarcasm_

_**Icarus_91 2:10 PM** It might have been a calculated risk for Lauren to post the video. I appreciate that. But this time she got lucky. I hope that Lauren knows enough to stop posting videos about where she is, and I hope that she and her daughter will reach their destination soon, and safely._

_**Dream_Samurai 2:11 PM** OK, I am scanning the articles that have pics of the shootout scene. Everyone try to go through all pics and see if anyone sees a tall, dark, military type lurking around. I'm sure it tehpoint Man.... If he's there._

_**Valkyrie 2:14 PM** DS you sound a little obsessed dude. A woman and her child got shot at and you're all "OMG tell me if you see a tall handsome man, the man of my dreams." _

_**Dream_Samurai 2:18 PM** *rolls eyes* whatever I just want to know who alls involved from dreamshare. I'm going down to the Den tonight to see if anyone has any info for me. I'll share what I find out._

_**Marlow 2:20** yes, I'm so sure all your crack den friends will tell you everything you want to know. If this was really such a big thing, all this dreamshare bullshit, do you REALLY think they would tell you, knowing you'd put it all over the internet?_

_**Valkyrie 2:26 PM** DS maybe if you were less self righteous people would take you seriously.  
_

It degenerated into a minor flame war, which Arthur mostly ignored, (as amusing as it was,) searching instead for more references to himself, Eames, or Cobb. Dream_Samurai, he was sure, was some wannabe who actually did go to a dream den. He didn't ping on Arthur's radar as either a threat, or someone who actually knew him. Icarus, he had his feelings about. The_Brain was strangely silent this time around. 

Arthur read up on some of those articles and looked for pictures of either him or Eames. His heart seized when he saw one of himself. Not because he was easily identifiable—his back was turned—but because of what it showed him. 

_An unidentified federal agent rescues his partner from a fall into lake in the aftermath of Friday's shootout_ , the caption read. _Both men are in stable condition._

And there was Arthur, kneeling on the pier, soaking wet, his back to the camera. EMTs had just put Eames onto a stretcher, alive, breathing. Arthur was wiping water off his own face. His shoulders were slumped; he looked battle-weary and shocked, even from behind.

The grainy photograph sent him right back to that moment. His palms grew slick and cold.

But no one could identify him at that angle, in sopping wet jeans and a white shirt. So he clicked away and shoved the image, and the entire day, to the back of his mind.

He went back to the dream community and decided to troll under the name **The_Slender_Man** just to be a dick and fuck with everyone.

 _I am the infamous Point Man, and the rumors are true: I put out._

And 

_Hey Icarus, how about a one night stand? I'm easy._

And

_Dream Warrior, I think I saw you in a dream once, didn't you fight Freddie Krueger?_

He got a lot of _GTFO troll_ and _How can you joke around at a time like this you sick fuck?_ and a few .gifs of people bashing their heads against the wall or jumping out of windows. The mod tried to ban him but Arthur had so many ISPs that he was both impossible to trace, and impossible to keep off any comm. 

_Someone get me a martini, I just fucked your Mom,_ he wrote.

THE_Brain answered him with rolly-eyes and a wink, and Icarus_91 answered with a smiley face. A few minutes later, Arthur's phone rang. It was Cobb's number.

"Cobb, yeah?" he said. 

"It's me," Ariadne said. "Jesus, Arthur, how bored are you?"

"Is Cobb Icarus_91?" he asked, getting right to the point. "Because if he is, tell him that's really immature."

"No, I am," Ariadne said. "Did you really just offer yourself to Dom? What the fuck. And you fail so hard at trolling."

"I flushed you out though, didn't I?"

"All you had to do was ask, Arthur. If you think about it."

"Who's this Dream Samurai person?"

"Some wanker," she said. "He goes to dream dens and thinks he's a big shot because he's read up on Dom and Mal. He may have pulled an extraction, but it was on his roommate. He's no one; I looked into it."

"Looking into things is my job."

"You've got your hands full," she said. 

"Don't you dare make me redundant. I've been known to make my competition disappear."

"I'm so intimidated," she said. "What are you doing? And we can talk; the line's clear."

"I'm watching the car to make sure no one puts a bomb in it. Or didn't the car-bomb make the news yet? It was this afternoon."

"It made the news, but as an accident. Are you going to keep driving?"

"Yeah. I don't like the idea of leading this to Cobb, and to you, obviously. I just don't know where else to bring them."

"The Institute is sanctioned and protected. Saito's got his hands all over it and it's untouchable, and I know that Dom's trying to get a hold of him to get you guys on a plane..."

"That's not going to happen," Arthur said. "Not in time, anyway. Saito's long since paid off his debt to all of us; he doesn't owe us any favors."

"He'd still do it. Even out of personal interest. He's really deep into the study of limbo."

"Even so, airports are still a bad idea. I'm not sure who we're dealing with, and we have to keep moving, so we might as well move west."

"I'll call you if we can get you here faster."

"Do me a favor, Ariadne. Start a thread about the car bomb and see who runs with it. Persecution carries a lot of weight, especially where kids are involved. I want these people to know that they're being watched by the public."

"Do you think that's a good idea?"

"It's the best idea. We're already exposed. The only thing to do now is expose them."

"Will do," she said. "Umm, Arthur. You guys are all right, right? How's Eames?"

Arthur thought of the picture at the pier. She must have seen it by now. "He's fine. Babysitting, pretty much."

"You guys take care of each other."

"Yeah, we will."

"That wasn't a request, it was an observation. I'm saying: you guys take care of each other. It's pretty cool."

"Well. Yeah. I guess so. Okay, so I'm gonna get back to the internet now. Guess I'll see you on the boards."

"Call us tomorrow."

 _Us._ "Yeah, I'll do that. Get some sleep." 

Arthur hung up and went back to his laptop.

Hours had a way of flying by where the internet was concerned. He went to a few of his usual pages, played some mind-numbing games, and took a few _'Which Harry Potter Character Are You_ ' quizzes. He was Professor McGonagall in one, Hermione in another, and Dumbledore in yet a third. 

It was at the fourth hour that Eames's motel room door opened, and Eames peered out into the car, squinting. 

Arthur opened the back seat door and leaned out, already annoyed. "I told you five hours, Eames. I'm not done."

Eames got in the back seat with him. "Shove over then," he said.

"For fucksake," Arthur said. "You should have taken the extra hour."

"If Lauren's going to drive tomorrow, we can both sleep. Stop bitching at me."

Arthur put his laptop aside, still open, and reached for his bag.

Eames's hand came down on his shoulder, digging in on just the right side of painful. "I need you to relax," Eames said. "Your fretting is irksome and it's going to make us fuck up."

" _My_ fretting? _Irksome_?" Eames was so preposterous, sometimes Arthur didn't even have words for him.

"I'm all right, Arthur. I'm here, aren't I? I'm not going to..." He couldn't finish whatever he was going to say.

Arthur turned to look at him. He didn't like any of the endings to that sentence that his mind supplied.

Eames responded by hooking one arm around Arthur's waist and pulling him backwards, so that he was sitting on Eames's leg. 

"What are you doing? Eames. This is ridiculous."

But Eames was digging his fingers into the tight muscles in Arthur's back, pressing hard with his thumbs. It sent chills down his arms. 

"This is really not the time," Arthur said, but he dropped his head forward anyway.

Eames kissed his neck and dropped one hand from his back to his front, reaching into his pants.

" _Really_ not the time," Arthur said. But he made no move to get out of his grip. "Why now? Jesus, Eames, someone could..."

_Not now, someone could see us._

Arthur remembered the bits and pieces of the dream he'd had in the hospital. Fragments of images that seemed more like memories than anything else. He'd somehow reached Eames while he was down in Limbo, just skimming the surface of the dream while Eames had lived the whole thing. And he'd woken up first, leaving Eames alone.

Except in the dream, they had been on the hood of the car, and here they were in the back seat. So it was different. A reality that Eames hadn't already lived. Maybe that was why Eames was doing it here, now.

Or maybe he just wanted to. 

Arthur gripped onto the back of the seat and squirmed in Eames's grip, in the heat of his hand. This probably wasn't going to take too long. 

"Arthur," Eames said into his ear. 

Arthur dropped his head back onto Eames's shoulder, unable to help himself. Eames's other hand came up across his chest, holding him there. His warm, wet mouth pressed against Arthur's neck. 

"My Arthur," he said. "My love."

And that was all it took, in the end, to have Arthur trying to bite back a shocked cry as he arched into Eames's hand. He gasped in lungfuls of air, fingers leaving marks in the seat of the car.

"What the hell was that for?" he asked a few moments later.

Eames shrugged against him, scraping his teeth along Arthur's neck. "Just felt like it."

"You felt like it? The whole internet is blowing up about Lauren and Fiona and the shootout, and you're sitting here with your hand in my pants. Which is getting kind of disgusting."

As tactfully as possible, Eames withdrew his hand. Arthur reached under the seat and grabbed some napkins that he had swiped from the truck stop. "I really need a shower," Arthur said.

"Yes, go and get some sleep. I mean actual sleep, not the kind where you've got your laptop open all night."

"You're all right here by yourself? No headaches or anything?"

"Well of course my head aches. Seems natural when someone's cuffed you with a gun. But I'll be all right. I'll wake you at sunrise and we'll be off."

Arthur kissed him, then grabbed his bag and shoved his laptop into its case. "Be careful," he said as he exited the car.

He went into the hotel room and took a weary look around. Eames hadn't unpacked anything; the room was tidy except for the unmade bed. At least he had slept a little.

He made his way into the shower, shedding his clothes as he went.

 _My Arthur,_ he heard in his head. _My love._

** ** ** **

They got caught in Presho, South Dakota, at a rest area. 

They'd been driving all day, stopping only once for dinner after a long debate on whether or not to stay on the I-80. Eames wanted to; Arthur thought it was too obvious. They moved north to I-90. He should have listened to Eames, but in the end it didn't matter, because when you're nicked you're nicked, and these people were going to find them anyway.

It happened at around midnight. Lauren and Fiona had just used the restrooms to wash up. That was the way it was done on the road when you couldn't make a stop. Now Eames was in the restroom, checking his bandages and washing quickly.

Arthur sat outside with Lauren and Fiona, on a wooden bench next to a soft drink machine. A light flickered above them, drawing green moths. Lauren swatted at a mosquito on her arm. 

"They love me," she said, her face drawn and pale. She looked more heavily-lined than she had in the morning. "But they never seem to bite Fiona. Maybe I have sweet blood."

Arthur smiled as well as he could, which wasn't much.

That was when Fiona put her hand on top of his and said, "Arthur, I want to play a game with you."

The request was so random that Arthur just stared at her, trying to make sense of this. A game? From the girl who wasn't a child? And now? He fought the urge to check his totem. 

"It's a game my father taught me to play," Fiona went on. "It's called 'Second Chances.'" 

"I'm not much for games," Arthur said, which wasn't always true. But at the moment, games were the farthest thing from his mind, and something about this request instilled in him a vague sense of dread.

"It goes like this," Fiona said. 

She never finished the thought, because that was when the sedan pulled up behind their car. 

Arthur stood up and reached behind him, hand on his gun but not drawing it yet. When two men exited the car and looked at him, and at Fiona and Lauren, he knew they weren't here to use the rest area. He'd known it since they pulled up, but this was all the confirmation he needed.

Then the two men pulled out their ID cards and flipped them open.

 _Feds_ , Arthur thought, relaxing. He could deal with Feds. Had dealt with them in bits and pieces throughout his entire life. Feds weren't interested in the dreamshare; they just wanted criminals handed over to them sometimes. Maybe they were here to help.

Arthur flipped his ID open in return, when they were within seeing distance.

One of them shoved him, and the other pulled a gun.

Arthur reached behind him for his own gun, but the guy who had initially shoved him grabbed him by the arm and turned him against the wall so quick and hard that it ground his already cracked ribs up against the bricks.

Lauren shrieked, which would alert Eames in a hurry. Arthur trusted him not to come rushing out yet.

"That was easier than I thought," said the guy pressing him up against the wall. "Getting old, aren't you?" He took Arthur's gun and threw it. So far no one had opened fire. That was a good sign. 

"Tell me what you want," Arthur said, or tried to say. He knew these weren't the people who had initially chased Fiona, otherwise they would have shot from the car.

"You think you have friends in high places, don't you, Arthur?" the man growled into his ear.

"Leave him alone!" Fiona cried. 

Arthur didn't see what happened, but the kid shrieked and then he heard a thud, as if someone had shoved her. He struggled briefly, then felt the cool circle of metal pressed against the back of his neck.

"You don't have friends in high places, that's the thing," the man went on. "You have one friend, and he's a techie rat, just the same as you. You think a forged piece of paper can protect you? We're taking these two ladies, and you're going to stand down."

Lauren and Fiona went silent. Eames hadn't made his appearance yet, but he must have heard what was going on. Arthur didn't need to think for very long to figure out what was required of him. Eames was listening. And no one was shooting. Now wasn't the time to fight back. Now was the time to get some answers.

"You're not the ones who shot up the pier," Arthur said. "Or bombed the car."

"Walk away from this, Arthur," the man said. "The little girl is government property. She won't be hurt. But she belongs to us. Walk away, and we'll make sure everyone lives. Keep fighting, and you'll have two groups hunting you all down."

"At least tell me who the first group is," Arthur said. "I handed you guys a lot of high-profile cases. Courtesy."

Instead of replying, the guy shoved him harder against the wall. He felt his ribs creak and grind.

"I said stop it!" Fiona yelled. "You're hurting him!" She came up beside them and tried to kick the man in the knee. 

Arthur could have broken his knee three times already, but this information was too important to miss. The man just laughed at her and shoved her again. This time she fell against the lamp post and Lauren rushed to scoop her up.

"Fuck this," came Eames's voice, from behind the restroom wall.

Arthur caught a glimpse of him as he strode past, up to the first guy. His walk was quick and determined, head down, hands curled into fists. He was shirtless, having just washed off in the restroom – not exactly prepared for this. But then, it was Eames, and when he was like this, he didn't rely on weapons and plans.

The sound of knuckles on bone rang out with a crack. _That's Eames's right hook,_ Arthur thought, then came the sound of a body hitting the ground.

The guy holding Arthur had time to mutter, "shit," before he was lifted clean off the ground and thrown like a toy. Arthur heard him land on the car, a good five feet away. He turned to see the first guy still unconscious, and the second guy getting up off the car and pulling his gun.

He saw Eames's eyes before he turned away. He knew that look, and it never failed to turn his blood cold. And then Eames was grabbing the guy on the car and taking his gun away from him as if it was a mere annoyance. He threw it aside like trash and open-palm slapped the guy. It was enough to snap his head back against the hood.

"I am bloody fucking _tired_ of this," Eames hissed in the guy's face, before slapping him again. "I'm fucking tired of being negotiated with at gunpoint. I'm tired of you suited up thugs waving your cocks around." He dropped his voice even lower, and leaned in closer. "You had better hope that you have some good information to share with me. Talk."

"We're just from the government," the guy said, his voice high and shaking. "That's all, just doing our job, the project Somnacin corps."

"And the others?" Eames said. "The ones who blew up the car."

"Freelancers – we think. They worked with her father, they were his people. They think she's dangerous." He swallowed hard. "She... she is dangerous. But we don't want to hurt her."

"Are there more of you coming?"

"Yes. Of course." The guy gave a nervous laugh, like the question was too stupid to ask. "We're the U.S. Government."

"Yes, and you just got slapped around by an unarmed man," Eames said. "Anything else you'd like to share?"

"There is nothing else," the man said. 

Eames popped him in the jaw with what looked like minimal effort, and put him to sleep. He pulled him off the car and threw him on the ground next to his still-unconscious partner.

Then he paced for a few seconds. Arthur knew better than to interrupt him, and it must have been obvious to Lauren and Fiona, too. He had to work off the anger and adrenaline for a few seconds. Arthur watched him, rolled his shoulders wincing at the pain the movement shot down to his ribs, and waited.

Finally, Eames turned back and stalked over to Fiona. Lauren shrank from him, pulling Fiona closer to her.

"You all right?" Eames asked.

"Yes," Fiona said, pulling away from her mother to face him. "He just pushed me. I'm okay."

Eames nodded and then turned to Arthur, leaning way too close to his face than was socially normal. "You?"

"I'm fine," Arthur said. "Did you get all of that?"

Eames blinked a few times. It was as if the man who had just thrown a few guys around walked out of him. For a second he was blank. He shook his head. Focused on Arthur. Took a breath. "I got it, yeah." He pulled his phone out of the pocket of his jeans and handed it to Arthur. "Edit my voice out."

"Right," Arthur said. He pulled out his own phone and turned to Lauren. "My phone is untraceable, do you understand?"

"Yes," she said.

"I want you to make a video and upload it to the dream forum, using my phone. Briefly say what just happened, and get footage of these two men here. _Do not_ mention our names. Don't get us in any of the frames. Get a shot of their car and their plates." Arthur bent down and took their ID cards from them, laying them open over their chests. "Get their ID and their faces. Say that your hired bodyguards disarmed them but make it clear that we won't be able to do it again, because these agents didn't know you had guards with you. Have you got all that?"

"We hired bodyguards who had the element of surprise, yes. Next time we won't be so lucky. Next time they're going to send more people and they'll get us. Got it."

"I'm going to edit the recording of what they said, and we'll upload that, too. All right?"

"Yes. I understand."

Arthur turned to Fiona. "You sure you're okay?"

She nodded, her face solemn.

"Good. Eames?"

"Fuck off," Eames grunted in reply, because now he was in one of those 'don't look at me' moods, which he tended to wind himself up into when he was at the end of his tether.

"Right," Arthur said. He grabbed his bag from the car. "I'm gonna go clean myself up. Lauren, you make the video, no more than ninety seconds, all right? No other voices. No other faces, no one in the frame except you, Fiona, and those two men. Do it before they wake up and then we've gotta move. We need to be out of here in five minutes. Got it?"

Various murmured assents and mumbles were his answer. Arthur went into the bathroom.

Once inside, he allowed himself to breathe. He went to the mirror, dropped his bag, and lifted his shirt to inspect the bruises. Prodded the ribs. He'd had worse. A scrape from the brick wall marked up the side of his face. That would heal in a few days, too. His bottom lip was a bit bloodied, but no big deal.

The fluorescent light colored him harshly, unflatteringly. The skin under his eyes looked dry, dark, and lined. He'd always had lines around his eyes; it was just the way he was, but tonight they looked deeper than they ever had. Arthur never really looked too critically at himself – or too flatteringly, either. As long as he looked the way he was supposed to look for a job, that was all that mattered. But tonight, he felt different.

 _Getting old,_ that guy had said.

But he didn't feel old. Not on most days, anyway, though he had lived pretty hard. Aches and pains, more than a normal person would have at this point. A lot of scars. A lot of healed up bones. 

And anyway, Eames was older than he was, and Eames had just cooled two big Fed-bulls, throwing them around like a sack of leaves. They still had plenty of fuel left, the both of them. 

He was just tired, that was all. Just tired and fed up.

He washed his face gingerly and patted it dry. Brushed his teeth and spat. The toothbrush had a little blood on it. He cupped some water in his hands and rinsed his hair. They were going to have to ditch the car, get something new, and drive straight through the night.

He stepped out of the bathroom and into the muggy night. Eames blocked his path, startling him. Arthur could see Fiona finishing up her video over Eames's shoulder.

Eames took Arthur's face in his hands and pressed their foreheads together. This wasn't any sort of romantic gesture. This was the "after the match" once-over. 

"All right?" Eames asked.

"Yeah." Arthur nodded against his head.

"I've got some tape in my kit. For your ribs, yeah?"

"No, I'm okay."

"Sorry I snapped at you."

"It's okay," Arthur assured him. "You all right? Your head's okay?"

"I'm good." Eames patted him roughly on the cheek and released him. And that was all. 

** ** ** **

Rock Springs, Potacello, Emmet, and finally the city of Weiser, on the border of Idaho and Oregon. 

The night air was chillier than it had been miles ago, days ago. 

Arthur's edit of Lauren's video had gone viral within two hours. The dream boards had exploded.

_  
**SuccubusIncubus 3:33AM** Holy SHIT. Shit has gotten real._

_**Valkyrie 3:48 AM** This is insanity! How unfair... that poor child and her poor mother! OK I realize this has been edited down, but it would take a LOT to fake something like this._

_**Dream_Samurai 4:00 AM** Am I the only one here not surprised by this??? Am I also the only one here who REALLY want's to know who there "BODYGUARDS" are???  
_

And so it went. All the while they drove on, Arthur at the wheel, down empty roads and past mountains and plains, in a new car. Eames had been a thief before a forger, and a forger before dreamshare, and he had proved himself to be top of the line when it came to both of these yet again. The car he'd stolen was actually really good on gas, too. And the tinted windows were nearly black, top notch. Arthur loved tinted windows. Aside from the practicality and safety of them, he liked the look, the way it made a car look seamless.

They came to the Street Motel to rest for one last night before moving onward to Portland. To the institute, to the end of the trip. And hopefully to some peace for Fiona and her mother.

Arthur parked the car and got out first. He took out one of the ninja stars he'd bought in New York, and flipped it between his fingers. It felt warm and sleek in his hand. This was like a good luck charm.

Eames stood up and stretched under the garish light of the parking lot. He absently rubbed his head, yawning as went to get his go-bag out of the trunk. Lauren sat in the backseat, with her feet out of the door. She looked dazed and exhausted. 

Arthur leaned against the car and flipped the ninja star into the air a few times while he waited. It gleamed in the orange light.

Fiona slid out of her carseat by herself and Arthur watched her drag the little suitcase they'd bought her out of the car, with her meager clothes and belongings. It had wheels and she pulled it along behind her. Had she carted her own stuff around before her time in limbo? What kind of child she had been? Had they taken road trips? Father, mother and daughter going to Disneyworld or something. He wondered. 

She turned to look at him, as if she could feel him staring. 

_I want to play a game with you._

_It's called 'second chances.'_

He wanted to tell her, ' _Yes, I'll play along. Yes, show me how to play that game,'_ but his lips felt numb. He was too tired. His pulse went thrumming in his skull. 

' _Arthur._

_Arthur._

He flipped the throwing star into the air again.

He was too tired to even be on his feet, but there was still a ways to go. They had to finish this mission. They have to

_make it to the Institute._

_Ariadne is waiting outside of the glass the doors. She's not alone; a small group is assembled behind her. They cheer when Fiona gets out of the car. Arthur doesn't know them, so he remains in the car with Eames._

_What can Cobb do for Fiona? He tries to imagine. The great Wizard Cobb, returning to Fiona a childhood that she's had inside her all along._

_Cobb and Ariadne show Arthur and Eames around the house while the kids are at school. The viral videos have made them a popular team and Arthur doesn't want to be on anyone's radar. It feels like everyone is watching. They stay until summer fades and Autumn dawns._

__The house, we need to get back to the house, _Arthur thinks—or maybe says._ It's safe there. __

 _But Eames says no, lie low for a while, the house is too exposed (_ it isn't _,) too many people have seen them there (_ they haven't _,) and let's take seven weeks and then meet in Berlin. Seven weeks, like they always do, to let things blow over._

_Berlin._

_The club where they first sat down together and had a drink. Where Arthur had first decided he wanted into those pants and had thought_ 'hell with it' _and dragged the hot British agent, Dom and Mal's best forger, outside with him. Beer and German techno, flashing lights behind them._

_That club is long since gone, turned into a restaurant with a bar, and this is where Eames wants to meet seven weeks later. So, seven weeks later, this is where Arthur waits._

_And waits._

_The speakers play some slow song with a saxophone whining dejectedly around a faux-jazz piano melody, and Arthur feels ridiculously stood up._

_The waitstaff start cleaning up, and Arthur waits, sending texts to Eames that start out casual and gradually grow frantic. The knot in his stomach tightens._

_The next day, there are no texts, no calls._

_He contacts Yusuf, Cobb, Ariadne. No leads. After a few weeks, he tries Eames's old enemies. In the following months, his family, the ones he doesn't even talk to. Finally Saito, and by this time he's willing to beg for access to every locked file there is. Hospitals, morgues. Months, years._

_He tries hacking into Eames's most private accounts, to see where he might have last spent money. Arthur is good, but he's not that good. He's never had to go up against Eames's security before._

_Eames starts out a mystery and then becomes a known oddity, the Missing Dreamwalker. Arthur follows his ghost until his hair turns grey and falls out, until he can't anymore, always searching, and asking, '_ Where is Autumn Road? I was promised Autumn Road.' He asks until bitterness dries him out and he begins to think ridiculous things like, 'It's not fair; Autumn Road belonged to us. _'_

_Standing on Berlin Bridge, a year to the date, as he always does, at age sixty-four, he thinks that of course it isn't fair. Fairness was never part of the deal. Standing on Berlin Bridge and getting knifed in the side by some shithead he doesn't even know – also not fair. Who stabs a man one year away from senior citizenship just to take a wallet with almost nothing in it?_

_And why always sixty-four?_

_Isn't he always sixty-four?_

_He's going to bleed to death on this bridge, a slow death. Maybe someone will even find him and put him in the hospital, prolonging it. And what if he ends up on life support? Trapped in limbo for centuries, maybe. Alone and unable to die, perfectly lucid. No one in the waking world with the right to switch him off. That won't do._

_So Arthur jumps. The cold water seems to rise up to meet him, and_

__Arthur woke up utterly disoriented for the first few seconds.

"Shh, it's okay," said a female voice.

_Lauren._

He looked around, orienting himself quickly. He was in the hotel room. The air conditioner hummed and shuddered; the room was cool. Lauren sat on the edge of the bed. Fiona sat on the other side, her knees tucked under her. Her tiny hand rested on top of his. She stared at him as if in a daze, her mouth slack, eyes glassy. Arthur looked away from her, back to Lauren.

"Eames?" he asked.

"He's in the car. He said he'd take first watch and we should let you sleep for a few hours."

"Did I..." How to phrase this without sounding stupid? "Did I at least make it to the bed?"

Lauren smiled, sympathetic. "Mr. Eames brought you in here. You've been driving for hours without rest. I noticed you didn't really eat anything either, just coffee and a granola bar. Don't worry. It was very graceful."

"Shit," Arthur said, rubbing his hand over his eyes. He glanced at Fiona, who looked more present than she had before. "Oh, sorry."

"It's okay," Fiona said. "It's just words." She kept staring at him. Staring _into_ him.

It clicked. The kid could remote-dream. _'I want to play a game with you. Second Chances.'_

"Fiona?" Arthur began. He didn't know what to ask her.

Fiona looked at Lauren. "Mom? Can we have a few moments, please? I want to talk to Arthur."

"Don't bother him too much, sweetie."

"It's okay," Arthur said, bracing on his forearms and pushing himself upright. "I have a few questions myself."

"I'll just go and have a shower in the next room," Lauren said. "I'm gonna leave the door open, Fiona. In case you need anything."

"Sure," Fiona said. She didn't look at her mother, instead keeping her eyes trained on Arthur's.

Lauren stood fidgeting for a moment, before turning to leave.

"Did you put me under?" Arthur asked.

"No. You did that yourself."

"But you were in the dream, right? I didn't see you, but that wasn't my dream."

"It was your Berlin, your restaurant place. Your life."

"What's Autumn Road?" Arthur asked.

"I don't know. That's yours, too."

Arthur sighed, frustrated. These answers only led to more questions. He took a moment to untangle it. Remote dreaming wasn't unheard of, and obviously it was very easy for Fiona; that was simple enough to grasp. But for her to show him this trajectory of events and to make it seem so real that he couldn't even question it - this was something he couldn't fit into his head.

"What do I do?" he asked.

"I also don't know that," she said, looking away from him. "I'm sorry. I never know what people should do. My father was the one who taught me to play the game and I couldn't even save him. They found us wherever we went. And they're just regular people, Arthur. They're just dreamers like we are, only they thought my father was too dangerous because of the remote dreamshare. Then they found out I could do it, too. I can steal any idea and I don't need a PASIV."

"But they don't know about the other thing. About the whole 'second chances' … thing? Game? Whatever it is."

"No. And I want that gone, too. I don't want to be able to unravel trajectories anymore. It makes me tired. And it makes me hurt, worse than limbo. I don't care about the limbo part, Arthur. I'll bet you're even right. I can probably forget it in a few years. I fell in love with people in limbo, when I grew up there. But they were just projections. They were me. I lived with _me._ "

"I said that to you when we met," Arthur said. _Only days ago._ It felt like years.

"I know, and I said that how we perceive people is no different from how we perceive projections. That when we dream, it's no different from when we're awake. What do you think of that now? Because you've been in control of your dreams for so long. You've always had lucid dreams where you control it, right?"

"Most of the time," Arthur said. "Most of the time I know it's not real."

"But when you think it's real, then it is."

Arthur laughed tiredly. "Cobb's going to love you."

"I don't care if he loves me. As long as he can help me."

He looked at her young face and ageless eyes. And he really, really hoped that Cobb could.

"So I shouldn't let Eames go," he said, mostly to himself. "To Berlin," he added.

She smiled. 

Arthur clenched his hand and it closed on something sharp and cool. He picked the ninja star up and looked it over.

"You dropped that in the parking lot," Fiona said. "Mr. Eames said you wouldn't want to lose it so he put it in your hand. Is it a totem?"

"No. Just good luck. I also have a lucky hat."

"You make your own luck, Arthur," she said, smiling. "That much is clear." She slid off the bed. "I'm going to go to my room, okay? I'm tired."

"Right." He watched her go until she reached the door that joined the hotel rooms. "Fiona, whatever you just did..."

She turned to look back.

"Thanks for that," Arthur said.

She smiled before she turned and left. 

Arthur got out of the bed, gripping the throwing star, which now felt cold and slick in his palm. His courage waned with every step he took, which dismayed him. He prided himself on being a courageous man in all aspects of life. But in this, he felt like a child.

He just kept reminding himself of that restaurant in Berlin. Sitting at the bar where he had first, well, more or less molested a young agent named Luke Bishop, his old rival, who had finally ended up as simply "Eames" to his colleagues. That stupid restaurant bar with that ugly song playing away in the background, Arthur waiting for years, waiting until the end of his life. Eames, murdered somewhere, an anonymous rotting corpse. He was certain of it. 

He opened the motel-room door and stepped outside into the fall night. He waved hesitantly at Eames in the car parked just a few yards away before walking towards him.

Eames opened the backseat door and poked his head out.

"All right, Arthur?"

"Yeah, fine," Arthur said. He gripped the throwing star until it bit into his palm. For good luck.

"Done falling all over the parking lot then?"

"Fuck off." Arthur slid into the backseat beside him. 

"Come for another hand job?" Eames said. 

"Uhh, no. I need to talk to you."

Eames lost the smile immediately, looking cautious and worried. He obviously didn't like the sound of that. Well, who did like the sound of that? It was probably the worst way to broach a topic.

"You're shaking," Eames observed.

_I dreamed everything that's going to happen and I don't like what I saw. I don't know how to tell you any of this._

"After this mission," Arthur said. "We should, umm."

"We should split up and lay low," Eames said, still cautious. "And then regroup. Yes?"

"No. We need to stay together after this. That's... that's definitely the best thing. We can't split up for our usual seven weeks and we can't meet in Berlin. That won't work. We stay together and, we can, you know. Head back upstate for a while."

"Arthur, that's too..."

"Also I think I should have access to your accounts." He rubbed his thumb along his good luck ninja star. He couldn't look at Eames, so he focused on the silver metal in his hand. 

"What for?" Eames asked. 

"In case of anything, you know? I would need legal access. And the other thing is, Eames, if something should ever happen to me..."

"I don't want to talk about what may or may not happen to you, Arthur," Eames said. 

There was an edge to his voice that Arthur recognized in his own, too. Of course: Eames had been in limbo. Fiona could have played her "game" with him, too. He thought of what Eames had said to him upon waking. _'I lived without you for so long.'_

Arthur risked a glance at him, half-lit by the orange light. Eames hadn't had a chance to shave. Arthur refrained from touching him.

"If something should ever happen to me," Arthur went on, "I would need someone to make all the important decisions. Like, if I should end up on life support. Or if I died, what would happen to my estate, all my money and possessions and stuff like that. All of my secrets, you know, from the business. I don't have anyone else that I trust. I need it to be you."

Eames just stared. Arthur stared back, defiant, daring him to mock, to not take him seriously.

"Are you asking me to be executor of your will, Arthur?"

"No."

"Then what are you asking me?"

Without looking away, he took Eames's hand, forgetting that he had a ninja star in his. Oh well, it was supposed to be good luck, anyway.

"I'm saying I think it would be really helpful to me if I had someone to take care of all my legal shit if I should become incapable in any way. I wouldn't want to be a burden to anyone. I don't want to be one to you either, but someone has to deal with my estate if I die, and to take care of whatever work I leave behind, either by destroying it or publishing it, depending on the context and the current climate when it happens. Or if I should ever end up in the hospital and unable to make decisions, I want someone I trust to make those decisions for me. And that person should have every right available by law to carry out those wishes. The only way to accomplish all of that with any kind of practicality is marriage."

And yes, maybe his voice had cracked when he said it, but he had said it; the words were out of his mouth and he was still managing to look Eames in the eye. 

When Eames didn't answer, Arthur pulled his hand away. Eames looked down at the throwing star that he was now holding.

"Keep it," Arthur said. "It's good luck."

His heart wasn't breaking, though he did feel a little disappointed. It would complicate things to have to ask someone like Cobb to deal with all of his legal shit, as nothing more than a friend. Cobb had his own life now. But he would have to figure something out.

"Arthur," Eames said, finally, "that's just not good enough."

"No, that's fine," Arthur said. "I'll make other arrangements. It was just an idea. But the important thing is that we need to go back to upstate after this. Don't ask me how I know, I just..."

Eames put his hand over Arthur's mouth. Arthur stopped talking, annoyed now on top of feeling way too exposed and vulnerable and like a total idiot. He pulled away from Eames, hoping his face conveyed that annoyance and nothing more. Christ, he'd just had a stupid dream and then had come running in here to set up this wild scheme, without thinking it through. Stupid, that's what it was.

"It's just not good enough, Arthur," Eames said. "If you're asking me to marry you, this is the wrong way to do it."

"What?" 

"You come stumbling out here like a drunk in the middle of the night, blather to me about the pragmatism of making things legal, and hand me a ninja throwing star."

"But..."

"It's all about practicality, is it?" 

"Well, I guess in a way it is. But Eames, think about what I'm telling you. What I'm _asking_ you, and what that means about how I, you know..."

"Feel?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, dear," Eames said. "Not _feelings_. Let's not even utter the word."

"I trust you," Arthur said. He wasn't sure if it was anger or desperation he was hearing in his voice. He just felt shaky and upset and his ribs were starting to ache, although maybe a little deeper than on the surface. "That's really... I mean, there's no one else in the world that I trust."

"I'm honored," Eames said, dry.

"You should be, shithead. I've been dodging fucking bullets since high school and, and getting shanked in the back by my best friend and partner—Cobb I mean, not you, on the Fischer job--I've never forgotten about that. And I have some really intense documentation on not only dreamshare, but the entire government and this is the kind of shit that can blow things wide open and after I'm gone, and I have no one to look after any of that. Not to mention the fact that there are hundreds of people who would be more than happy to let me rot in a hospital somewhere or put me into a coma and there's no one else in the world who could or even _would_ do anything about that. You're the only person who knows what the fuck they are doing when it comes to me. You're the only person who knows _me_ and I can't trust anyone else with this, Eames. Anyone else would gum it. I want you to have the right to make decisions about my life if I can't make them anymore, Jesus, what more can I say? I'm not going to beg you; I won't even ask again. I'm just trying to explain why I thought it was a good idea."

Eames turned to look out the window. "Not a word about love in that whole thing."

"But..." _Marriage isn't about love,_ Arthur was about to say, but quickly thought better of it. That was definitely the wrong thing to say here. "Eames, but you know that I love you. I told you that already. I prove it to you all the time. I'm more about doing than saying, you know that. That's why I don't want you to go to Berlin. I need you to come back with me when this is done. Okay, forget about the marriage thing, it was stupid, but I need you to come back with me."

Eames shifted in the seat to face him. "I can't bloody well forget about it, you asked, you put the idea out there."

"Okay, well I already feel really stupid about that, so just accept my apology and let's move on."

Eames didn't accept his apology and he didn't move on. He took Arthur's face between his palms and kissed him, with some uncomfortable mix of ferocity and tenderness that Arthur didn't know what to do with. Everything inside him ached. Eames didn't let him go immediately, breaking away slowly with a few lingering kisses.

 _And here we are, making out in the backseat of a stolen car,_ Arthur thought. _Adults making adult decisions._

He laughed a little, and Eames pulled away, looking closely at him.

"You're ridiculous," Eames said. "But, I've given some consideration to your proposed business plan, and I find your reasoning sound."

Arthur just stared, as much as he was able to this close. His head was spinning. Hadn't Eames just told him no? 

"But I'm not going to do this in a whirlwind of fuckery and panic," Eames said. "We're not doing this because we're afraid of dying. We're going to be utterly calm about it."

"Yeah, that's what I'm saying," Arthur said. "Calm. But I thought..."

Eames leaned back in the seat and considered for a moment. "I've got different accounts under different names, and so've you. We should marry at least a handful of them. I can forge those papers."

It took him a moment to answer. "Okay," he finally managed. He hadn't really expected Eames to say yes. Or to say no. Arthur wasn't sure what he had expected, but here it was and now they were talking about it.

"At least one of the arrangements should not be forged. We should really do the actual thing once, with witnesses. But for which names?"

 _Autumn Road_ came into Arthur's head, maybe in his voice, maybe not. He wasn't sure. "The names we're using now, I guess," he said. "The Goodman and Hartley names. Because those are the names that own the house together, and it's in New York, and there won't be any problems doing it there." His arms and legs tingled and for a moment he felt like he was going to be sick. It hit him all at once, how fast this had gone from being a waking, panicked idea, to an actual _thing_. He swallowed hard.

"Good point," Eames said. "Rings?"

"When we're not working. Not on the job. Too risky." Then, suddenly, it became about making actual strategies. In this, Arthur felt at home. Calm descended on him again. These were practical decisions about safety. 

"The witnesses, then?" Eames asked.

"People we don't know. It needs to be really quiet. I think we should probably only tell people we already trust with need-to-know business. Cobb, Ariadne, Yusuf. Saito still keeps tabs, he's going to find out anyway. Your family?"

"Nah, fuck 'em," Eames said. He didn't even bother to ask about Arthur's family.

"Right, then that's how we'll do it," Arthur said.

"Right."

The silence that descended them turned slightly awkward, which Arthur found ridiculous between people who had spent so much time without clothes.

"Nothing else has to change," Eames said. "We go on working as we did before."

"Yeah, of course. Except for one thing."

Eames looked at him, cautious again, waiting for him to go on.

"After a job, we don't split up. We go to the house to lie low. It's a safe-house, that's why we got it. The seven week separation thing isn't working out."

Eames did the thing where he stared, seemingly, into the back of Arthur's mind. "What did you dream?" he asked. "After you fainted in the..."

"I didn't faint, for fucksake, we're traveling with a human PASIV..."

"Right, whatever," Eames said, "after you _fell asleep standing up_ in the parking lot. Seriously, Arthur. What did you dream?"

"Nothing that I can explain. Fiona, she says she can..."

"Second chances," Eames said. "Is that it?"

"Did she tell you the same thing?"

Eames turned away, tight-lipped and looking disturbed. "She didn't have to tell me. But that part's done with, isn't it?" 

Eames pocketed the throwing star. After a few minutes, he put his hand over Arthur's and squeezed gently. Arthur turned his hand palm up. They sat together in the back of the car, silent, for a good long while.

** ** ** **

Nothing changed after that, at least not between them. 

In Portland, the sound of a helicopter in the distance put Arthur on immediate alert. Eames, who was driving, heard it too, because he cut a glance toward Arthur when it started to get louder. Then he looked in the rearview mirror to see if Fiona or Lauren had noticed it. They were quiet in the back. Arthur peered over his shoulder to look at them. They were both asleep.

The whirring of the chopper got progressively louder until it was impossible to ignore. Arthur lowered the window and stuck his head out like a dog, turning to look at the sky. The chilly air and bright sun stung his eyes, making them water. The chopper flew in the distance, behind them to the east, but gaining.

"Call Cobb," Eames said. "Tell him we're close and we've got a tail."

"Right." Arthur reached for his phone.

"What?" Lauren said, coming awake. "Did you say someone's following us?"

"No worries," Eames told her. But his mouth was tight and his eyes were too keen. 

Before Arthur could dial, his phone rang. He and Eames shared a startled glance.

Arthur answered the phone. "Yes?"

"Ahh, Arthur, finally," said an accented voice. Arthur could hear the sly smile in his voice. 

"Saito?" 

"I hear you have met some people who might be of interest to the dream community."

"Yes, we have. It's a little complicated."

"So I have heard." Saito had a way of always sounding as if he were the only one in on the joke. "Is that your stolen car, driving north-west on the Interstate 84?" 

Arthur leaned out the window again, craning his neck to look up. The chopper was fast approaching. Over the phone, Saito laughed.

"Are you shitting me?" Arthur said.

Next to him, Eames broke into relieved laughter. 

"What is it?" Lauren asked, as Fiona woke up beside her in her carseat.

"It's a friend," Eames assured her, as Saito continued talking.

"I am not shitting you, Arthur," Saito said. "I'm sorry if we gave you a fright, and very sorry it took a long time to find you. I have an interest in that young lady."

"My interest is in helping her," Arthur said.

"Noble," Saito answered. "However, I've found that we can help others and learn from them simultaneously. In my experience this is often the case."

"I... yeah, that's true," Arthur said. "We'll be getting to the clinic in a few hours."

"I'll cover you until then," Saito said, and hung up before Arthur could thank him. 

Arthur looked down at his phone as he could somehow see Saito through it, before ending the call and tucking it away.

"Well," Eames said, smiling. "And that, as they say, appears to be that."

Eames was so fucking ridiculous sometimes, with his big stupid smile and crooked teeth, saying random dumb things like ' _that appears to be that,_ ' that Arthur had to fight the urge to pinch his cheek. Instead he just laughed and shook his head.

They didn't stop for dinner. They didn't stop to use the bathroom. They just drove on for the last few hours, Saito's chopper whirring overhead. Eames drove, quiet and determined. What could he have been thinking about? Arthur tried to think very little, other than to plan a defense in case anything should happen at the clinic. Unlikely, but it was always good to be prepared.

It was late afternoon when they pulled off the interstate, down winding, tree-lined roads, and finally to the drive that lead up to the private clinic. A sign marked the entrance to it, white and plain: Sleep Disorder Clinic of Oregon. 

The chopper hovered, then took off slightly west until it was out of sight. Arthur could still hear it.

"Are we here?" Fiona asked. Her voice sounded shaky, on the verge of tears. 

"Yeah," Arthur said, turning around. "we made it. Sorry it took so long."

Lauren reached to the front seat and placed her palm against his cheek. "Don't you ever apologize for anything."

Awkwardly, slightly embarrassed, Arthur gave her a smile because what else could he do?

"Looks like we might have a bit of a welcome party," Eames said.

The high, iron gates were no more than formality, since it was a public clinic, and they stood open already. Lining them, and lining the road to the white, metal and glass clinic itself, stood rows of people. Some were cheering, some holding signs that said "WELCOME FIONA" and "WE SUPPORT YOU."

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Arthur asked. Never had he been more grateful for tinted windows. People with camera phones shot pictures and recorded everything. This stuff would all go on the internet later.

"We're going to have to ditch this car pretty quick," Arthur said. He dialed Cobb. While he waited for him to pick up, Eames drove slowly. People converged on it as if they were celebrities, tapping the windows, shouting congratulations. The car rocked from side to side. 

Cobb picked up and said, "Arthur! You guys must be here?"

"We're outside the clinic," he said. "It's kind of slow going. Umm. There's a lot of people. Can we come in the back way or something?"

"That's what he said," Eames muttered.

"Shut up," Arthur said, away from the phone.

Cobb was laughing. "Drive around; we have a delivery entrance. I'll have them open the gates for you. We don't have crowd control here because we don't really get crowds, you know?"

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that."

"It's nothing you did," Cobb said. "I'll see you in a few."

"Good." Arthur ended the call. 

He told Eames to go around the back, and finally they came to a chain-link fence. Two men in scrubs stood by to open it, allowing them in. They tried to gently usher the crowd back out before closing the gates behind them, and padlocking them.

Arthur turned around and told Fiona and Lauren, "We get to take the rock star entrance. You guys ready?"

"I'm ready," Fiona said, somber.

Once they had parked, a woman, also in scrubs, came out to lead them inside. Arthur stretched, glad to be standing. Eames came to stand beside him. They very carefully didn't touch. Fiona pulled her little suitcase along behind her.

Inside, Cobb was waiting. He surprised Arthur by greeting him with a hug – an actual one, with both arms around him, squeezing. Cobb had slimmed down and simultaneously looked younger and older.

"Eames, good to see you," he said, greeting him with a handshake as if they were just long-time business associates. As if Eames hadn't helped him lose a tail in Mombasa years ago. The criminal side of Cobb diminished each time Arthur saw him.

"This is Lauren and Fiona," he said.

Lauren took Cobb's hand. "We've heard... god, such amazing things about you, Mr. Cobb," she said. "I have faith in you."

"Well, I have faith in the resiliency of the human mind," Cobb said. "I hope that I can help you both find it." He didn't bend or crouch down to greet Fiona, instead just holding his hand lower.

Fiona shook his hand like an adult, as she had done with them. "I'm very glad to meet you, Mr. Cobb," she said. "I believe in resiliency as well. I'm glad that you still do. I have no doubts that you can help me."

"Fiona, I have some papers for your mom to sign. Why don't you get comfortable for a while?" he said. "I'll have my kids show you to your room. Phil, James?" 

Phillipa and James came out into the hallway. Arthur recognized a cue when he saw one; they had been waiting in the closest room. Although Phillipa hadn't seen Arthur in over a year, she ran to him first and wrapped her wiry arms around his waist. At eleven, she had her father's height and hair. Her eyes and mouth were Mal's, so obviously that Arthur wondered if sometimes Cobb couldn't bear looking at her. James--the image of Cobb—awkwardly shook Arthur's hand behind Phillipa's back.

"Guys," Cobb said, prying Phillipa away from Arthur, "you remember Mr. Eames, don't you? You met him ages ago."

"Sure," Phillipa said, shaking his hand. She didn't meet his eyes, instead looking at the floor and blushing.

"You were wee when I saw you, both of you," Eames said. "You've done that growing up thing."

"Sorry," James said, with his father's smile. "Believe me, if I had my choice, I'd stay a kid." 

Phillipa smiled at Fiona. It was easy to see what they were doing. There was a children's ward here. Cobb wasn't going to go rummaging around in Fiona's head, pulling adulthood out of her like a rotten tooth. He was just going to let her be a child.

Before Cobb's kids could lead her away, Fiona said, "Wait. Please, just one thing. I need a moment." She took Arthur's hand in her right, Eames's in her left. "With both of you. Alone, please?"

"Yeah, sure," Cobb said. "Go on and use that room. We'll wait."

Together the three of them went into the room where James and Phillipa had been waiting.

The rooms were bright, with pale pastel colored walls and wide windows covered by filmy curtains. The only indication that it was a sleep disorder clinic (or actually, a high-end dream therapy clinic) were the thick blinds that could be pulled down to block out all light. A flat-screen television was mounted on the wall over a chest of drawers. There was a private bathroom to the left. It looked more like a hotel than a clinic.

Fiona led them both to the bed, where they sat down, waiting. She stood before them, still holding their hands.

"I know that you two didn't have to do any of this for me," she said. "And I know more or less what Mr. Cobb is going to do, and not do, to help me. This is my job from now on. I have to make myself better. And that's fine, because I'm safe here after today. My Mom is safe. So, I guess, thank you."

They both looked at her awkwardly. Arthur felt unsure of what to say.

"No thanks are in order," Eames said. "I have an inkling that you've given us something in return."

"I may have," Fiona said. "I don't know, exactly. I really don't. I also don't know what the Autumn Road is, but it's yours now."

"Thank you," Arthur said, though he didn't quite know why.

"There's one last thing," Fiona said. "Just one more thing. I don't know what it is yet, but you'll know. And then that's it. You can go. I just wanted to thank you both, because you went out of your way and put yourselves in danger for us."

Arthur didn't like the sound of _'one last thing_ ', but he knew better than to ask. She already said that she didn't know what it was.

"All right, that's it," she said, letting go of their hands. "I think I have some children to meet and some games to play."

She turned and left the room, to join Phillipa and James. Arthur sat on the bed, staring at the door. Eames did the same. For a few seconds, neither moved. 

"I'm tired," Eames said.

"Yeah, me too. It'll be nice to sleep with both eyes closed tonight," Arthur said.

"And not have to wake in a few hours to keep watch."

"Yeah."

By mutual, unspoken consent they turned to each other. Arthur tucked one leg under him for a better angle, and then Eames was sliding his hands around the back of Arthur's neck and pulling him closer. His kiss was soft and unhurried. His thumbs stroked Arthur's neck, along his jugular and carotid, as if reassuring himself with his pulse. 

Arthur pulled away and said, "Everything okay?"

"Yeah," Eames said. Their voices were low and unnecessarily conspiratorial, as if sharing a secret.

Arthur thought of Eames in the hospital, a few days ago. He thought of how he'd fallen asleep in his chair beside Eames's bed, and skimmed the surface of his thoughts. ' _Arthur, my Arthur. My last dream. So very long._ ' 

He wanted to tell him again, suddenly: _I'm as real as you are._ Then, as he thought it, he wasn't sure what he meant. He went back further in his thoughts, into his past, cementing himself into the life he remembered, the one he knew he'd lived. A lonely childhood, a violent adolescence. His obsession with his first love. Murder, blood, corpses before he'd finished high school; his thirst for revenge. Military. Dreamshare. Dom and Mal. The rogue British agent, his rival, his eventual ally. Mal's broken body. Cobol, Saito. Inception. Eames.

Oh yes. Arthur knew how he'd gotten here.

"And you?" Eames asked, breaking his reverie. "Everything all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"You looked like you were somewhere else," Eames said, holding his jaw as if he thought he would drift away.

"I was just thinking. And I'm tired. You know."

Eames didn't buy it.

"I guess when you really think about it, sometimes," Arthur said, "it doesn't matter how you got here. I mean, we're here, so what's the difference? Everything we know... _Everything_. Life could..." He shrugged helplessly.

"Be a dream, sweetheart?" Eames finished.

"Sh-boom," Arthur said.

Eames laughed softly and stood up, pulling Arthur by the arm. "'Baby, we'd be so fine.'"

"Yeah. We really better get back out there before people start to wonder."

"Before Cobb gets it in his head that we're shagging on one of his fancy clinic beds."

They walked out together, Eames's arm around Arthur's waist until they opened the door and stepped into the hall. It was habit for them to stop touching when others could see them, just safety. But this time, he felt too light without the weight of Eames's arm on his back.

The group still stood in the hall: Cobb talking to Lauren, Phillipa and James talking to Fiona. A few orderlies milling around the halls. And to Arthur's surprised delight, Ariadne was coming around the corner. Her face lit up when she saw them, and she quickened her pace.

And then everything stretched out around Arthur, as if someone were pulling time like a taffy. The air itself seemed to slow down and colors blurred briefly, before snapping into sharp focus.

_I'll never make it in time._

He caught sight of the orderly reaching behind him, and knew that the man was no orderly. That he didn't even belong at the clinic.

Arthur had his gun in the ankle holster. He reached for it.

_I won't make it in time._

Ariadne's smile faded. Cobb made a sudden move toward his own kids, with that parental instinct that didn't even have to see the actual gun to know. 

Arthur's hand landed on his own Glock

_and I don't make it in time. Fiona dies._

Lauren screamed and dived for her daughter

_but she doesn't make it either,_

and Eames was holding something in his hand, something that caught the light.

_That's an impossible shot._

But Eames was a man of impossible odds. He whipped the throwing star at the man with the gun.

Time came back into focus. Arthur gripped his Glock, ready to fire. He didn't have to. The man who was not an orderly had already fired his pistol. The shot went wild; the bullet thudded into the ceiling. Bits of panel and dust floated down to the floor.

Arthur got to the gunman first, knocking him back against the wall. The man was screaming, gushing blood from his face. Head wounds bled a lot, but this blood was mixed with something else, something slick that splattered onto Arthur's hand and face as he spun the guy around against the wall.

"My fucking eye! My fucking _eye_!" the man screamed, trying to crumble into a ball on the floor while Arthur pinned his arm behind his back.

Everything else was peripheral: Ariadne's ' _Oh my god!_ ' and Lauren and Fiona's cries, Phillipa's and James's shrieks of terror. Cobb and Eames were quiet amidst the chaos. 

The gunman slid down the wall, leaving a streak of blood against it as he went. Arthur pinned him to the floor with a knee in his back. The man continued screaming.

"Call the ambulance," Cobb said.

"On it," Ariadne said. 

Then Eames was by Arthur's side and they held the gunman down together as he bucked and writhed, screaming about his eye, his fucking _eye_. Arthur felt just sick enough to be grateful that the man was face-down. He wasn't sure he could actually look at that.

"Holy shit," he said to Eames. 

"I had no idea it was going to turn out like that," Eames said, looking pale and startled.

The glass doors opened again, and a cadre of suited officers, all with badges that Arthur could not identify, surged into the hallway.

"Private security," one of them announced. "Clear the scene, private security!"

Saito's security team swarmed them, pulling them to their feet and off of the struggling gunman. Arthur went willingly, happy as fuck to be away from him. The new guys jostled him around some, pushing and shoving. Amid the chaos, Arthur felt nothing but a calm lightness. The removal of a burden.

 _One last thing,_ Fiona had said.

Fiona was crying, Lauren was in hysterics. Ariadne, whom he hadn't even had the chance to greet before finding himself covered in blood and tissue, stood shaking with adrenaline. Cobb's kids huddled behind their father, clinging to his waist. James was crying into the back of Cobb's shirt.

But Saito's team was here, and Saito was laying a hand on Arthur's shoulder saying, "Thank you again, Arthur, Mr. Eames. I'm sorry for all the trouble this has caused you. By the way, Mr. Eames, what fine aim you have."

"Not really," Eames said. "I absolutely did not expect that."

"I'll take over from here, of course, if that is all right with everyone," Saito said. But what he meant was, ' _I'll take over from here._ ' 

For Arthur, it was more than all right. He wanted to go home.

** ** ** **

Home had to wait. They got caught up in re-doing clinic security, and ended up staying in town for the next few weeks.

They didn't have much time to see Fiona or Lauren.

Cobb opened his home to them, offering the spare room if they wanted it for the duration of their work. Arthur was quick—but he hoped not _too_ quick—to decline. 

It was dinnertime when they got to Cobb's house, only hours after dropping Lauren and Fiona at the clinic. The first thing Arthur needed to do was use the bathroom. In it, he found not three toothbrushes, but four. And on the counter, a round hair-brush for long, wavy hair, and a bottle of perfume. Arthur liked Ariadne, loved her in a way. But seeing evidence of her semi-permanence in the Cobb residence made him have to swallow back a lump in his throat. 

No, this was good for Cobb. This was great, actually, and for the kids, too. He just hoped it was going to be great for Ariadne. He wasn't convinced of that yet, but reminded himself that it wasn't his place to make that call.

The rest of the house wasn't anything like the one Cobb had shared with Mal, and yet she still lingered in every corner, in small ways. Photographs of her still stood on various surfaces, which must have been a torment to Cobb, but were probably there for the kids. 

The home sprawled on acres of land with a high-end playground installed in the back, and a small, above-ground pool with a gate around it. Beyond the yard was a slope high enough to be called a mountain, covered in evergreens. The house itself was cluttered in the way that Mal had never let her home become; this was Cobb's habit.

Ariadne was on the phone ordering pizza when Arthur finished wandering the halls. James stomped into his room and came back out with a remote control helicopter that he not-so-subtly showed off. Phillipa was texting someone, her fingers flying with excitement as she likely told her school friends that someone had shot a gun in her Dad's clinic today. They were both overwrought, overexcited and would probably not sleep for days.

Cobb and Eames stood in the kitchen, Cobb pointing out various things about the room that he liked, such as the wide window, and view of the trees behind the yard.

Arthur thought of the house in New York with slight yearning. He had a mountain, too.

Once Ariadne was done on the phone, she came to Arthur, smiling, and hugged him. "What a reunion, huh?" she said. "It wouldn't be the old team if people weren't waving guns around us."

"Sad but true," Arthur said. 

Over pizza they discussed upgrading security, Cobb adding that he hoped it would only be a temporary measure. 

Cobb asked if they wanted to stay for a bit after dinner. Ariadne looked hopeful.

"I'm really tired," Arthur said, not even having to lie. "We're gonna be around for a while, so we'll probably see you tomorrow if that's okay."

"You can use that spare room, Arthur," Cobb said. "Save you the trip. Both of you, I mean. Unless you want to... I mean there are two spare rooms, if you don't, I don't know. You guys didn't used to. Or whatever you want." 

Eames laughed at Cobb's discomfort and said, "Appreciate the offer, but we've still got a bit of followup to do, and we'll only get in each other's way. A hotel room is just the thing. We're used to working out of those."

Arthur said, "We're going to meet Saito and his crew first thing tomorrow morning at the clinic. We'll do a full overhaul of security, and I want to talk to some of his people, tell them about the ones who were after us. We can meet back here afterwards if you want. I still have a few things to tell you about Fiona and her situation. I guess Saito will want to hear about that, too."

"Then let's make it a meeting," Cobb said. 

Arthur hated the fact that he felt relief leaving the house and getting into the car. He felt ashamed at how happy he was to be going to a hotel. But it was noisy in Cobb's house, with the kids, and crowded with memories that he didn't know what to do with. 

"You're very quiet," Eames said, as Arthur started the car.

"I'm tired."

"You were quick to get us out of that house."

Arthur was sure that he couldn't hide his pained expression. He hadn't meant for it to be obvious. He wasn't even sure he could articulate why he needed so badly to leave.

Eames roughly wrapped a hand around the side of Arthur's head and jerked him closer. 

"Hey, quit it," Arthur griped, swatting at Eames when he kissed his temple. They weren't even out of Cobb's driveway yet.

Eames held him still, chuckling with his lips against the side of his head. "You all right, though?" Eames asked, finally letting him go.

Arthur made an attempt to flatten his hair back down. "I'm fine. It really doesn't bother me. I think it's great, actually." He looked over his shoulder to back the car out of the driveway.

"I was asking about what went on today, Arthur. With the crazed gunman with a ninja star in his eye socket. I'm happy that you're all right with everything else, although I must admit that your priorities and ability to compartmentalize sometimes teeter on the border of pathological."

Arthur huffed out a breath through his nose and concentrated on driving. 

"And it is somewhat alarming, occasionally, how you can look down the barrel of a gun with relative courage, but the idea of Cobb and Ariadne shagging has you running out of his house like your arse is on fire and your hair is catching."

"I didn't _run out of..._ "

"I know you loved Mal, but I think your issue is that you think Cobb should pine a bit more. Don't you think he's paid enough, with interest?"

Arthur felt the first flush of heat that came before a real, true argument. He tried to tamp it down, but he was really fucking tired and upset. "Stop telling me how I feel," he said. "First of all, you're way off, but more importantly you're out of line. Back off."

"Whatever you say," Eames said.

Arthur gripped the steering wheel. This was decidedly not how he wanted to end the day. But it needed saying. "And don't give me that 'whatever you say' bullshit, like you think I'm making things up. I'm not. I know exactly how I feel, and you should be glad that my years of recognizing danger make it easier for me to cope in an actual dangerous situation. Stop judging me for being good at what I do, and really, _really_ stop trying to guess how I feel about things that, frankly, aren't even your business."

"I might be out of line," Eames said, "but you brought this up. I actually was just asking if you were all right; you were the one who got defensive and started talking about Cobb and Ariadne. For what it's worth, Arthur, I do recognize that you still mourn for Mal. That's not a judgment."

"Just stop trying to tell me how I feel about Cobb."

"I'm sorry," Eames said. 

When he didn't go on, or try to offer any excuses or justifications, Arthur felt some of the tension drain from his shoulders. He flexed and relaxed his hands on the wheel. "It's okay."

They rode in awkward silence for a few minutes. Eames took out his phone and called up a map, looking for the hotel. 

"I just don't want either of them to get hurt," Arthur said, suddenly, without having planned on saying anything at all. "If I had lost you, and then found someone else, I'd probably hurt them. Not meaning to or anything. It would just be a constant comparison and they would always fall short and I think they would know that. Maybe Cobb's different; I'm not sure though. He used to say that Mal was the one love of his life and he could never imagine anyone else."

"That's always the case when one is in love," Eames said. "When you feel like that, you can't imagine being with another person. But then one day that person is gone, and if you fall in love again, you feel like that again. Some people are good at being in love."

"I'm not," Arthur said. "It's hard for me to begin with. After high school, it was the last thing I wanted. I'm really bad at it. It's inconvenient and too much worry."

"But you fell in love again."

"I didn't mean to. And that first time... Eames, when I was a kid, that wasn't love. I was just pissed off and possessive."

"Yes, violent and obsessed and a terrible person," Eames said, parroting what Arthur had told him days ago, ( _ages ago_ ,) back at the house. "How awful you are, Arthur, such a monster for feeling those overwhelming, teenage emotions."

"I wasn't your typical teenager. That's what made it so bad. I acted like one and had all the shitty lack of impulse control that everyone else had, but I had resources that made me dangerous. People got hurt."

"You tried to help."

"She was pregnant." He didn't mean to say it. It just came out. He'd never uttered the words before, not in his life. Not even in a dream. Eames's silence made him want to glance over at him, to see if he looked shocked, or betrayed (ridiculous, he knew, but couldn't help thinking it anyway,) but he kept his eyes on the road. His head was starting to hurt. Arthur swallowed hard. "I think of how different my life would have been. And then I think, you know, how people say that things happen for a reason. I don't believe that, but I can see why people say it."

Eames's voice was soft. "You've carried that around for too long."

"I really haven't. I don't think about it too often, honestly. Which makes me sound really shitty, but. It was a long time ago."

"No one expects you to hold onto some old pain out of guilt, Arthur. You are allowed to continue living. You're allowed to still be happy. We owe nothing to the dead. Or, if we do, it's to keep on living and not dishonor their memory, I suppose. Can't go about being a slave to them; it's not like they care, anyway. If there is, in fact, something after life, I have to assume that one's consciousness has larger things to focus on than if you've felt sad enough for them."

"I know," Arthur said. His voice sounded soft and he was glad the car was dark. 

"I'd offer you more platitudes, but I don't like to insult you."

Arthur laughed at that. "Thanks."

"You're going to turn right at the next light," Eames instructed. 

Arthur did so, and thought that was probably the end of their conversation. Which was fine, because he felt somewhat lighter on the inside. And he was tired as hell and ready to go to sleep.

Then Eames said, "You're never going to scare me away from you. There's nothing you could tell me at this point that would make me run from you." 

Arthur didn't have any answer for that, not one that he could articulate. 

"Two miles up ahead," Eames said. He rested his hand firmly on Arthur's leg for the rest of the ride.

** ** ** **

Arthur spent most of the following day at the clinic with Saito and his team. He didn't see Cobb, Ariadne, Fiona or Lauren. He spent hours doing what he prided himself on doing best. He showed Saito all the data he had collected, showed him the dream boards and respectfully asked him to not try to influence anything that went on in that public forum, because it was the pulse of the community outside of the main hub. They circled the clinic, looked into every room and every corridor. Arthur collected data on every employee. 

Saito had had the gunman from yesterday taken into private custody, so that the police and FBI couldn't get their hands on him. 

"In one year, Arthur," Saito told him, "the business of dreamshare will no longer be under the hand of one government. The branch is still weak and I will see to it that it gets broken. Not for my own personal gain, but because they chase little girls around the country."

Arthur didn't doubt him.

Late in the day, he took a look around the outside of the building. The group of people who had gathered to watch them drive up the previous day had diminished, but a few stragglers stood around by the barred gates where technicians were installing security cameras.

There was no way to avoid them. He had to go take a look at the new gates and cameras if he was going to be thorough. So he put on his best blank look, his Business Face, and strode up as if he owned the place. He was all too aware of eyes following him, of people recording, of the possibility of photographs. As far as any of them were concerned, however, he was just another security grunt, some guy in a suit.

"Hey. Hey, excuse me," one of them called out. 

Arthur turned and looked through the bars of the gates, unsure who was being addressed.

"Yeah, you, _you_." A scrawny, goateed twenty-something in a wool hat beckoned him over. 

"Can I help you?" Arthur asked when he got to the gate. 

"I'm just wondering," the guy said, "are you on the dreamboards? The forum?"

"Me? No."

"But you know who we are."

"An internet community?" Arthur asked. He knew exactly who he was talking to.

The guy stuck one skinny arm through the bars. "Dream Samurai," he said. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, indicating an older, shorter man behind him and said, "Succubus Incubis." 

Arthur shook his hand, and didn't offer a name in return. "Do you have any information about what happened yesterday?" he asked. "Any rumors going around, anyone who might have wanted to hurt these people?"

The guy grinned at him. "Man, don't bullshit me, you know what time it is." 

Arthur stared at him until he looked away. Eames was much better at that staring shit than Arthur was, but he managed. Then he asked, "Got any info?"

"Only what made it onto the boards," Dream Samurai said. "The videos. Some of them were heavily edited, but obviously, the attacks on the little girl still happened. I just wonder what got edited out."

"Guess we'll never know," Arthur said. "If you have any information, or if you find something out, call the clinic instead of the police."

"Aren't you going to give me your card?" he asked, with a small smile.

"I don't have any cards," Arthur said. "I'm just security."

"Uh huh." He looked over his shoulder at his companion and they smirked. "You do look familiar though."

"Can't see how," Arthur said. "Anyway. Call if you have anything for us." He turned to leave.

"Hey!" Dream Samurai called. "Listen, are you the point man? Cobb's point man?"

Arthur looked over his shoulder and said, "Nope." He turned and started walking away.

"Do you think?" he heard Succubus Incubus ask.

"Maybe," Dream Samurai answered. "Hard to tell. He's smaller than I imagined."

Arthur stifled a laugh and kept walking.

He finished up with Saito and his team well after dinner time, and drove back to Cobb's house, Eames beside him in the car. They stopped for Chinese on the way.

Cobb was already home when the got there, along with three of Saito's guards. The guards' car was parked in plain sight. One of them was patrolling the backyard.

"Thorough," Eames remarked, hefting a greasy box of food food out of the car.

"They've got to be," Arthur said. 

"Apparently so. When people have no qualms about shooting children."

Arthur walked through the house again while Cobb set the table. He stopped at the mantlepiece, staring at a photograph of Mal. It was framed in dark wood, with roses etched into it. It took him a second to realize that he had taken that photo years ago.

Ariadne came up behind him. "I like this picture," she said.

"Me too," Arthur said. "That's a beautiful frame."

"Oh." Ariadne took a step back and looked down at the floor. "Yeah, I made that frame last year. I didn't know how Dom would feel about me doing that but then I thought, eh, what the hell. I wanted to do something nice."

Arthur stared at her, eyebrows raised, trying to figure out how he would feel. There were no shoes he could place himself into. He couldn't relate to anyone in this household. 

This was good. Arthur could not only live with this, but yeah, it was good. Ariadne was 29, Dom was 41. She was old enough to take care of herself, and he was old enough to have learned the things he should have known years ago. The time was right. 

"Thanks for taking care of Dom," Arthur said. "Umm. I mean, I'm glad that you're, whatever. He was so young when Mal died and he deserves a second chance. The kids probably like you, too."

He couldn't look at her, not even when she took his hand, but he knew she was smiling.

James and Phillipa were already at the table. Cobb dished out portions for his kids while Ariadne filled their glasses with fruit juice. Arthur still longed to see Mal's hand pouring juice for her children. But James smiled at Ariadne, and Phillipa just kept texting.

"Put that phone down," Cobb told her. "We don't text at the dinner table. Besides, I need a sit-rep from you guys. Are you okay with the guards hanging around the house?"

Phillipa put her phone down and pursed her lips. "Doesn't bother me. As long as people aren't trying to shoot us, I guess. I'm not, like, scared or anything though."

"You should be," Eames said. He glanced quickly to Cobb before continuing. "I'm sorry, but it must be said. Being scared witless isn't good, but fear can be your best friend in some cases. Keeps you alert."

"Cheerful," Phillipa remarked, smiling. Her cheeks turned pink again, which, Arthur noticed, they had a tendency to do whenever Eames looked at her or spoke to her. 

"But Mr. Eames is right," Cobb said. "And if you see anything out of the ordinary, tell me first. Then we alert Saito's people. Okay? That goes for both of you. Nothing is too small to notice, and no one's going to think you're overreacting. Right?"

"Sure," they said in unison. 

"Tell me about Fiona," Cobb said.

"She's a little weird, I guess," Phillipa said. "She's, like, super smart and it's hard for the other kids to understand her."

"But you understand her," Cobb said, twirling lo mein onto his fork.

Phillipa shrugged. "Sure, I do. James kind of does."

"I understand her fine," James said. "It's just she thinks she's all grown up, when really she's not. It isn't her words that are different. Just how she acts. Like she knows it all."

Phillipa rolled her eyes. "She kind of _does_ know it all. But I mean, it's cool in a way. We tried to get her to play in a pretending way, like you said. But she didn't really get into it so we just ended up talking a lot. She didn't really want to talk about what happened to her Dad. I told her we lost our Mom and she just said sorry."

"It's still new to her, honey," Cobb said. "But I'll tell you what. Helping her will help you, too. Because you've had this experience and you've grown up with it. She'll be able to relate to you two and it will help her heal. Just keep doing what you're doing, okay?"

"There was something else weird about her," James said. "It's like she... _knows it all._ " He glared at Phillipa, defying her to correct him again. "I don't mean in a smart way. Just like, I don't know, she knows stuff."

Arthur caught Eames's eye again. Neither of them had to say it. _Second Chances._ Cobb saw their shared glance, understood they didn't want to discuss it with the kids around, and changed the subject back to techniques for talking to Fiona.

After dinner, he didn't have to ask the kids to leave. It was still warm and bright enough for them to go outside and play. Cobb watched them through the window as he shoved cardboard boxes into the trash.

"So what was all that Significant Glancing you two were doing?" Ariadne asked as she wiped down the table. "It was after James said the part about Fiona knowing stuff."

Arthur looked at Eames again, wondering where to begin, how to begin, and if they should even begin. Eames shrugged.

"Kind of like you're doing now," Ariadne said. 

"If it's something about Fiona," Cobb said, "I need you to tell me."

Eames leaned against the counter and looked down at the floor. Arthur could hear him thinking of how to put it without sounding insane. Arthur was clumsy with words sometimes, but there was no way to talk about Fiona's other abilities without being totally straightforward.

"She plays this game called Second Chances," Arthur said. He took a seat at the now-empty table and waited for Cobb to sit across from him to continue. "First of all, she can remote-dreamshare. That's the only part that anyone else knows about, what's getting her into so much hot water. They don't care that she's been to limbo, married her projections, and memorized Shakespeare. They just don't like the remote dreamsharing because it's dangerous. They don't know about the Second Chances thing."

"Explain it to me," Cobb said.

Arthur looked at Eames again, as if he could pull an answer from his brain.

Eames sat down next to him. "It's sort of like this," he said. "Fiona says she can dream about the future. She says she can work out trajectories of cause and effect. She then dreams up the future, shows you what it looks like, and leaves it open to change."

Ariadne sat next to Cobb. The four of them were at the table now, two on one side, two on the other.

"But it's just a dream," Ariadne said. "You have no way of knowing if it's going to come true or not until it happens."

"So I guess," Cobb said, "the important question is, _has_ any of what she's dreamed actually happened?"

Arthur thought back from when he had first met Fiona, until now. He thought of the dream he'd shared with Eames, in limbo. Skimming the surface of their long lives while Eames lived it fully. Had any of that come true yet? There was the incident of car sex, but in retrospect, it seemed ridiculous to consider that. The dream version and the real life version had been different, for one. Second, they had a lot of sex in a lot of different places, so it was almost a given. And third, no way in hell was he telling Cobb about that.

But his own dream, the one he'd had when he'd fallen in the parking lot. That had been real. More than real. Eames had died, and Arthur knew—he was sure, he felt it, he _knew_ \--that changing their plans had saved him.

Or, no: would save him in the future.

"Well," Eames said, "she did say that something was going to happen before the gunman in the clinic."

" _Something_ was going to happen?" Cobb asked. "Was she specific? Did she say, 'this particular man is going to bring a gun into the clinic, and Eames is going to throw a ninja star at his face,' or did she just say 'something'?"

"Umm," Arthur said, "she just said... no, it wasn't specific. She did say that she knew they were going to kill her father, though."

"But she didn't know how to stop it?" Ariadne asked. 

"Well. No."

Cobb leaned forward on his elbows. "Look. She's got a gift, there's no question. Remote dreamsharing, and as easily as she does it, that's truly something amazing. But you have to realize, she's been through a lot. Not only with her time in limbo, and the crazy, out of proportion perspectives that's probably given her, but with losing her father in such a violent way. Of course she's going to want to have some kind of power over her future events. She wants to prevent something like that from happening. After we lost Mal, and I came home, Phillipa went through a phase where she had to wear Wonder Woman bracelets everywhere, every single day. In the bath, in bed, she didn't take them off once. She said they protected her. It was like her totem, keeping her in reality the way her Mom wasn't. People think of all different ways of protecting themselves. Security blankets, compulsions, prayer, it's all kind of the same. This particular child just wants the power to change the future, because her past was so traumatic.

"Now if she's actually doing this to people, pulling them under with her and keeping them in limbo in order to save them, her intentions are probably good. She is just a child. Kids keep frogs in jars because they think they're helping them, you know? When really she's just keeping prisoners."

Eames was staring at Arthur and trying not to; he could feel it. Arthur felt like an idiot. He struggled to think of a time, any single time when Fiona had told him the future, and it had actually, literally come true. The last few days all blurred together: all the running, but especially the dreaming. That kid's way of getting into his head. 

"I mean," Cobb said, a bit more softly, "I'll definitely look into it, sure. But it seems like maybe she's just a highly logical little girl trying to get over major trauma. Of course she knew they were going to kill her father. All signs pointed to that. It's worth talking about for sure. I just wouldn't go making any major life decisions based on her predictions, is all."

Cobb had said the words offhandedly, but they burned right into Arthur's core. Eames didn't move a muscle, through years of training himself into having no discernible response. But Arthur still felt the tension from beside him, as if they were still connected in a dream. He could stare a killer in the face and walk through the dreams of evil men, but he couldn't look at Eames. Instead he looked down at the table, trying not to panic.

"That's not why I asked you," he finally said. "I was going to anyway." Okay, maybe not necessarily true, but it didn't stop him from wanting to make a point of it. "It was just a dream," he went on. "It didn't mean anything. The only thing it made me change my mind about was you going to Berlin. Everything else I said because I wanted to."

"Arthur?" Cobb asked. "Not sure what you're talking about."

"He's talking to me," Eames said. "Though I can see how it's difficult to tell. Are we doing this now, Arthur?"

He looked at Eames, realizing that he was being kind of a shithead about the whole thing. "If you still want to, then I mean, yeah, we were going to tell them anyway. If you still want to. I just wanted you to know that I didn't feel forced into asking you. I didn't do it out of fear. I wasn't thinking, 'oh, we could die, we'd better get married.' That's not how it was."

"What was that?" Cobb asked, at the same time Ariadne said, "Oh my god, married!"

Arthur didn't look at them. He kept his eyes on Eames, who was staring into him like he always did, prying away the layers as if he could get into Arthur's head without the PASIV, without the intrusion of projections. Like he could just walk freely through all of Arthur's secrets just by staring at him. 

"If you still want to," Arthur said again, meeting his eyes without flinching or looking down.

Eames gave him a casual half smile. "'Course I want to, yeah. I already said so." Again, giving nothing away.

Arthur turned to face Cobb and Ariadne. "We talked about it on the way here," he said. "It was my idea. I mean, it makes sense, I gave it a lot of thought. I have a lot of secrets and a lot of assets, and there's no one else I can trust with them. Or really with my life. If anything should ever happen to me, I need someone to be in charge of all that shit. I don't have anyone else who doesn't have their own shit going on, or who I could trust as completely." He was looking at Cobb now, but was totally aware he was talking to Eames. "How long has it been now, over a decade? Everything I have should be in his name, if anything happens to me. And I don't really want to be with anyone else. At this point I can't even imagine it, so when I spend all this time between jobs with someone, he's really the only one I can imagine doing that with. Pretty much ever. I used to think that was a bad thing, but, I don't know, it works. So I said, you know, we should just do this."

"You know," Ariadne said, "you kinda could have summed that up with one word."

"No, but it's more complicated than that," Arthur said.

"No, but it really isn't." And then, to break the awkwardness, she slapped her hand onto the table, grinning. "I approve of this. And while I've never seen you two do anything more than ridiculously stupid and dangerous things to protect each other, it's a no brainer if you ask me. Some people kiss and hug and hold hands in public. You guys jump through windows and blow things up just because you can't stand the idea that the other one could get hurt."

"That's right," Cobb said, "Arthur, you did jump through a window that one time when Eames was on the other side. Ten stories up."

"Three, for Christsakes," Arthur said. His face felt warm.

"Eames, didn't you go into a hostile dream knowing you could get infected with the dream-virus, just to get Arthur out of it? And how many bullets did you take for him by now, probably about five."

Eames coughed into his hand. "Three, I think."

Arthur added, "He also ran across the top of a moving train going past a cliff once, to save my ass. And broke into a high security facility to get me out."

"You jumped into an icy river after me," Eames said. "And took a back full of shrapnel so that I wouldn't get it in the face. And you blew that entire facility to shit with a suitcase full of C4, when I couldn't even get out of bed."

Arthur found himself smiling. "That was actually pretty fucked up. Yeah, but you dug me out of a shallow grave."

"Darling, now _that_ was fucked up." Eames was smiling now, too. "The first time I saw you fight was in a dream den. You disarmed the ringleader and broke his hand because he knocked your hat off."

"I broke his hand because he was waving a gun at us, the hat thing was secondary. And then you wasted the entire room."

"That wasn't long after you broke into my hotel room like a catburglar and went through my computer history."

"You were Google-stalking me," Arthur said. Peripherally he saw Ariadne and Cobb smirking indulgently at both of them. It was pretty embarrassing. "Oh man, we were kids back then, weren't we?" 

"Like you're so old now," Ariadne said. "In your thirties, oh no. Get a walker. I mean, come on, you guys are going to be hot forever, like George Clooney and Paul Newman."

"So, when is this happening?" Cobb asked.

Arthur shrugged and looked at Eames. "We didn't really talk about that part. I guess I just thought we'd finish up here, go back to the safe-house for a while, and then figure it out."

"Sounds about right," Eames said.

"Honestly, you two," Cobb said, "you can stay here. You don't have to keep going back to a hotel."

Ariadne was not subtle about kicking his leg under the table. "Would you leave them alone?" she said. "Stop making it awkward, let them be alone in a hotel room. Jesus, Dom."

"Oh!" Cobb's face was the picture of revelation. "Yeah. True. Sorry."

"So we should have a party or something," Ariadne said.

"Christ, no," Arthur said, over Eames's "Fucking hell, no."

"I mean like, a _subtle_ party," Ariadne said. "Just the four of us and cake or something."

"No cake," Arthur said. "No, this is...this is fine."

It wasn't 'fine,' with the two of them beaming at him and Eames like that. It was stupid and humiliating and ridiculous, and Arthur was just glad that he'd told them and that part was over.

Now they could get back to work. And when that was squared away, they could get back to New York. That was what he was really looking forward to. It was kind of strange, to be looking forward to something. Arthur either enjoyed what he was doing at the moment or he didn't, and when he thought about the future, it was usually to plan a strategy. To look forward with longing was different. He catalogued that alien feeling in the back of his mind for further perusal later. 

** ** ** **

Days turned to weeks in Oregon. Arthur saw very little of Eames during the days. He did not have occasion to see Fiona or Lauren again. Evening fell earlier and the leaves began to turn. Cobb's kids wore hoodies to school and played outside less. 

Their work, at least at the clinic, was done. Arthur wasn't sure why they were still hanging around. When it occurred to him that he was stalling—stalling something that he actually wanted—he started packing his bags at the hotel room.

Eames watched him from the other bed; they still didn't share when there were two. Why be uncomfortable?

"We going, then?" Eames asked. 

"If you're ready."

"I'm ready. I wasn't really necessary to this part of the project to begin with."

"I thought maybe Cobb was going to ask you to forge someone for Fiona."

Eames's smile was a small, secret thing. "Did you? Fiona would have sussed me out in a second. I doubt I could trick someone as skilled as she is."

Arthur looked back at his suitcase and zipped it shut. "Well, anyway. I'm ready now. You're still coming with me, right? To stay at the safe-house for a few weeks?"

"If you still think it necessary."

Arthur did, because every time he thought about them splitting up before heading back to the house, he saw himself sitting in that bar in Berlin, waiting for Eames. Saw, felt, tasted, smelled it, even heard the song that was ( _would be_ ) playing as he waited. He felt the years go by without him. He felt the knife slipping into his ribs on the bridge. Yes, he still thought it was necessary.

"But I mean, do you still _want_ to?" Arthur asked. "We could put off everything else, that's fine. I just can't shake the feeling of something bad happening if we're not there."

"That sounds an awful lot like an inception," Eames said. "But I want to, yes."

Inception or not, Arthur wasn't going to change his mind. "Then we'll just say goodbye to everyone and..."

_Say goodbye to everyone. Goodbye._

Arthur stopped, unsure of where he was going with that sentence. A wave of dizziness swayed him; he felt it physically. It was as if the entire future changed around him, one reality edged out of existence by another, and he _felt_ it. It disoriented him. He took a minute to shake it off. 

"All right, Arthur?"

"And get going," Arthur said. "What?"

"I asked if you were all right."

"I'm okay." Eames was giving him a side-eye, almost evaluating. "Why?"

Eames stared a moment longer. "Nothing. No reason." He slapped his hands on his thighs and got up. "Guess I'd better pack too, eh. Are we flying back, or driving?"

_Long chilly nights, hotel rooms, roadside diners in the midwest, eating in the car..._

"How about we drive back?" Arthur said, smiling. "Road trip."

Eames smiled back. "Yeah, all right. Another road trip."

** ** ** **

On their last day in Oregon, they stood in the back parking lot of the clinic. As Eames hung back with Ariadne and the kids, Cobb took Arthur aside. This was done on the pretense of saying goodbye for now and good luck—which was part of his agenda, surely—but Arthur knew when he was about to get a lecture.

"You're sure about this?" Cobb asked him, gripping his arm. "I mean, I never thought... You know."

"I never thought either," Arthur said. "It's really for practical reasons, Cobb. Someone has to be in charge of everything I own, and everything I know, if I can't be. It's not like we're gonna settle down and start having bake sales. We're not even living together."

Cobb looked surprised at that. "Ariadne said..."

"Ariadne triangulated a call from a safe house we decided to share. It's a dive, not fit for living in long-term. I still have my apartment in New York. Eames has his places in Mombasa and wherever the hell else he flops." This last part he added as a kind of _See? I don't even know where he lives. No big deal._

Cobb smiled at him. It was a strange smile on him, one Arthur hadn't really seen before. There was something loose and knowing about him, somewhere between carefree and resigned. "You love him though? You'll be happy?"

"Yeah, I'll be happy," Arthur said. "Sure I will. Quit acting crazy about this, Cobb."

Cobb gave his arm a squeeze. "You're using your defensive speech patterns. I'm making you uncomfortable; I'm sorry. I guess I feel like I need to look after you sometimes because you did it for me for so long."

Arthur shrugged and looked away, back to Eames and Ariadne and the kids. They were putting on a pretty good show of talking about shit, instead of waiting and pretending like there wasn't A Talk going on between Cobb and Arthur. Phillipa shamelessly clung to Eames's hand.

"One more thing," Cobb said. "Not a day goes by when I don't think of Mal. Actually not a minute goes by. You know that, right?"

Arthur looked at him, surprised. "Yeah, of course I know that. Me too."

"I still love her. It kills me, every day. I see her everywhere. I hear her voice calling my name, and I turn around and expect to see her. People tell you that it gets better, that it never goes away but it gets easier. Yeah, I guess if you count the fact that I'm functioning, I have a life and I take care of my kids and my job, and that I can feel things again."

Arthur laughed a little. "Those are kind of important things, Cobb. That sounds pretty good." He thought about how that might sound and was quick to correct himself. "I mean, that's _great_ , that's what everyone wanted for you. I mean that's how you _should_ be. Happy. Well, as happy as you can be. And for Ariadne to be happy, I want that, too."

"I can't speak for her," Cobb said. "But I just didn't want you to think... It's not like I can forget. People talk about 'moving on.' You never move on. It doesn't happen. There's not a single day of my life that I don't still hope... Nah, never mind. I don't want you to get the wrong idea."

"Then tell me what you mean."

Cobb let go of his arm and looked away. For a few seconds he looked as he had when they were on the run together: a man unsure of his life, clutching a useless totem like it was everything in the world. "I still have days—a lot of them—when I wish that Mal was right. That I'll get old here and finally just die, but I'll wake up in our bed or on our old floor, or hell, even in a hospital bed and Mal will be there saying, 'I told you so.' I think of that all the time. That would mean that none of this happened. I mean, Ariadne... maybe she wouldn't even be real."

"She's real, Cobb." Arthur felt that old panic rising in him again.

"I know. No, Arthur, I know that. Because wherever you are, _that's where you are._ What matters is your experience. This is my experience. I'm not going to try to wake up like Mal did; I believe in my kids too much. I would just wait it out, until I got too old to live. Then I'd wake up young again, with Mal. And then what? Everyone dies in the end anyway. You take what happiness you can find. If you get a second chance, or even if you get a few second chances, well, great. If that's what dreaming can accomplish, that's more than anyone can hope for and that's because of our work. And if this is it, if this is all the reality I get, that's fine too. I'm happy, I can do this. This is good. You take what you can get, Arthur. That's what I learned. If you're good with what you have, then you don't try to wake up, no matter what you think. Dreams feel real when we're in them because they are real."

"And if everyone else is a projection?" Arthur asked. "And like Fiona, you have no contact except with yourself."

"But we dream _together,_ that's the point of shared dreaming. Not everyone has to be a projection. We're all here. I know Ariadne is actually real."

Arthur nodded, thinking this over. "I thought you were just going to tell me to chill out about you and her together," he said, with a short laugh. This conversation was making his hands and spine shake.

"That, too," Cobb said. "But most important is to be who you are and love who you love. And if in the end it was all a dream, then you wake up and do the same thing." He shook his head with a somewhat embarrassed grin, looking down at the ground. "Listen to me talking like some kind of guru."

"That's kind of how people see you," Arthur said.

"Well it's bullshit. I cry like a little kid every day in the shower."

Arthur nodded, unable to meet his eyes. "Well. I'm sorry I was acting like a dick. It won't happen again."

"I'm sorry I was oblivious," Cobb said. "Hey, let me know what's going on with you, you know? When you get the chance. Keep in touch. Take care of yourself, Arthur."

 

** ** ** **

_"Goodbye," Cobb says._

_Outside of the clinic, saying farewell to Cobb, Ariadne and the kids happens in a blur of falling leaves tossed around by sudden, biting wind. Arthur finds it strange that he hasn't seen Fiona again. But then maybe she doesn't need his farewell, or Eames's._

They were quiet in the car until the sun set and they were out of Oregon. Eames plugged in his iPod and played Rachmaninoff. Arthur would have closed his eyes if he hadn't been driving. He'd listened to this with Eames on a train once, and then on a plane, too. 

That night they stopped at a motel and parked outside of their ground floor room. Before they got inside, Eames wrapped an arm around Arthur's waist and lifted him up onto the hood. He leaned in to kiss him. They ended up staring at each other. The unspoken thought of _no, we did this before,_ hung between them. Eames backed away slowly, uncomfortable. Arthur slid off the car. Neither was sure of what to say.

"Doesn't matter," Eames said as he unlocked the door to their room. "What matters is now."

Inside, he rolled his die. Awake, awake, reality, awake. Later, Eames went into the bathroom to shave, and Arthur followed, intending to get in the shower. He found Eames staring at the mirror. Just staring, concentrating on his image. _He's trying to forge,_ Arthur thought. And he couldn't.

There was only one bed in the room, so they shared it. He woke from a nightmare, struggling to breathe, with Eames's hand over his face and knee in his side. _This is why we need two beds_ , he thought.

The next day they ditched the car and Eames "bought" another. They rode through the midwest with the windows down and stopped at a roadside diner. Arthur ate a sandwich and tried to come up with something shocking to do, something to shake them free of this deja vu. He couldn't remember the details of the dream that they'd shared and he questioned anything he came up with. 

"I hate the phrase 'It is what it is,'" Eames told him, "but it actually is."

They decided to drive straight through without stopping. They were somewhere in the midwest at 10:30 PM when they managed to find an open pizza parlor. They bought an entire pie, took it to the car, and then drove out to where there were no streetlights. They pulled over and ate the entire pizza on the hood of the car. The car was still running—they'd both learned how to leave somewhere in a hurry--radio on, headlights off.

Before anything else could start to happen on the hood, Arthur scooted up to the roof of the car, pulled his jacket tighter, and leaned back on his elbows. Eames joined him, the car jostling and rocking under his weight, and lay down beside him. It was a tight fit, the two of them side by side. Eames slid an arm under Arthur's back and angled his hand behind Arthur's head like a pillow. It took some maneuvering, but Arthur did the same. Eames's hair was scratchy against his hand, as real as any totem. It didn't matter how real dreams felt when you're in them; once you questioned the strangeness of it, you usually realized you're dreaming. _No, this is real. It must be._

He'd seen the desert sky at night, so its brightness and clarity didn't surprise him as much as they used to.

"Do you know the constellations?" Eames asked.

"Just a few. I have an app for them on my phone but I never got around to using it. I know Orion and the Big Dipper. The usual ones people can recognize."

"The Big Dipper isn't actually a constellation, darling. It's a part of Ursa Major."

"No shit?"

"None at all. And you ought to know that, because Ursa Major is your constellation, Arthur." He dragged out his name, like he did when he was trying to make a point.

Arthur turned to look at Eames's profile in the near dark. Eames's fingers skimmed over his ear and neck. "How do you figure that one?" 

Eames looked at him, amused. "Oh, sigh," he said, "American education. Ursa Major is the Big Bear. That's what Arthur means, 'bear.' You're a bear."

" _You're_ a bear," Arthur said.

"Then you're a twink," Eames shot back.

Arthur considered all sorts of smart comebacks like, 'shut up' or 'fuck off' or 'your mom,' but instead they just ended up staring at each other.

"That's not my real first name," Arthur said, quiet as if anyone else could hear him. "It's one of my middle names, though."

"I know." His fingers threaded through Arthur's hair as he murmured, strangely, "Little raven."

It was the most natural thing in the world to lean over and kiss him. He didn't get to. 

' _Life could be a dream,_ ' the car radio played suddenly,  
' _if I could take you up in paradise up above,  
if you would tell me I'm the only one that you love,  
life could be a dream, sweetheart..._ '

"That's weird," Arthur whispered as a shiver ran down his back. "I remember how I got here. I remember everything. I can feel everything. But what if we're in Limbo together? Eames, just what if?"

Eames didn't look away. "Then we are. And we'll wake eventually."

** ** ** **


	4. 4

It was meant to be a road trip, and Eames really wanted to stop for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, to freshen up in shitty truck stops, and buy pointless trinkets. That night, they got a motel and Arthur fucked him on the noisy bed so hard he thought he heard the angels sing. When he told Arthur that later, Arthur called him a dumbass and went to sleep on the other bed.

They drove through the next day and took turns driving through the rest of the night, in four hour shifts. Eames took over as the sun rose. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Arthur shift around in the reclined passenger seat, pulling his sweater over his face to block out the light. The drone of the car was the only sound. He felt rested, though, not tired at all, and when it was Arthur's turn to drive, Eames let him sleep on. He was quite enjoying the ride. Nothing but quiet, his own thoughts, and Arthur drooling in the car beside him. 

Every time the panic started to rise in his throat, he reminded himself of two things. One: Nothing was going to change. They would have pieces of paper binding them to each other legally. In the event of Arthur becoming unable to do so, Eames would care for him or for his estate even without the piece of paper. He knew Arthur would do the same for him. But the paper made it easier. Eames was so utterly familiar with the power of documents that this wasn't even strange to him.

And two: In all likelihood, he was asleep, or possibly in a coma. Arthur had come down to search for him, and had gotten lost too. He would never say that to Arthur, even though Arthur suspected it as well. He wasn't worried. He had no plans to go around killing projections or treating them as if they weren't real. They were a part of his or Arthur's unconscious mind, and he didn't wish to hurt them. He wasn't going to try to wake up, and traumatize everyone the way Mal had. It was possible that he was in such a deep coma that trying to kill himself awake would only serve to kill his actual body topside.

Whatever this was, it was a human experience. It was _his_ experience and he would own it. With the sun rising in his eyes as he drove east, toward that ridiculous, dilapidated old house that Arthur would have humped if he could, he made this decision. He would do nothing to rock this boat. He would just wait it out, merrily, merrily, merrily. Or as merrily as he could. 

Arthur woke when they were about three hours from the town, around 9 AM. He blinked his bleary eyes, scrubbed his hand through his messy curls, and rubbed his hands over his face, creased from sleeping on his crumpled sweater. He looked at the clock and said, "What the fuck, Eames, why didn't you wake me?"

"I was enjoying myself," Eames said. 

Arthur tsked and huffed and rolled his eyes as if Eames had done him a disservice. "You could have been getting some sleep."

"I'll sleep tonight, won't I?"

"That's what you think," Arthur said, somewhat nonsensically. 

"You've got plans for me then?"

Arthur made a scoffing noise through his teeth and said, "Come on, pull over. It's my turn. I know how to find the house."

"So do I, Arthur. As I drove there before."

"Yeah but we have to go shopping for groceries."

Eames knew how to find groceries, thank you very much, though apparently Arthur thought he was going to drive and drive until they both starved to death in the car. But it occurred to him that maybe Arthur wanted to drive up to the house. Maybe it was a _thing_ he had. Who knew? He was a silly person sometimes. So Eames pulled over, still feeling light in his heart and in his head, and got out. 

The air smelled like pine and water, damp earth and rain. Almost like England, really. He stretched, twisted to crack his spine, rubbed his scalp. His ass hurt from sitting for too long, and his back gave the odd twinge. He guessed he didn't have the core strength he used to. He'd have to work on getting that back.

While Arthur fussed around with adjusting the seat, Eames went behind a tree to have a piss. What a lovely autumn day it was. The trees were turning, all red and orange in the morning light. 

As he was zipping his flies, there came a knock at the tree behind him. 

"I need to go, too," Arthur said. "Are you done?"

"Did you just knock on the tree?"

"I didn't want to just walk around while you were peeing."

"You have seen my cock countless times."

"I didn't want to be rude."

That settled it, Arthur was a silly person. "The tree is vacant," Eames said.

He went back to the car while Arthur had his turn. When Arthur came back, they had a heated discussion about which was better: grocery stores or small, local markets. Arthur bought food in packages and said it was best to keep various things bottled, frozen and in cans, in case of emergency. Eames would swear that Arthur was stocking up for a zombie apocalypse; he honestly would not put that past him. Eames liked fresh food that he could cook. In the end they agreed that both had their merits, so they stopped first at a supermarket (which was too bright, sterile and noisy, and which had all sorts of gaudy Halloween decorations up,) and Arthur bought an armful of fruit juices in big, plastic bottles, a case of water, frozen dinners, paper towels, toilet papers, ("See, you can't get these at a farmer's market, Eames,") and all sorts of soap, detergents, shampoos, razors, light bulbs and such. It looked to Eames as if he were stocking up for slightly more than seven weeks.

Arthur paid for all of this, and he whipped out one of those "frequent buyers' club" cards, to boot.

They loaded Arthur's Zombie Apocalypse supplies into the back of the car and went on their way.

"There's a little farmer's market a few kilometers up," Eames said. "We need to stop there for edible things."

"I don't know what a kilometer is, Eames, this is America." Which was bullshit, because Arthur was able to do the metric conversions in his head quicker than anyone Eames had ever met; he was brilliant at maths. 

Eames told Arthur what a wanker he was, and then directed him to the market he'd found when he'd come up here to meet Arthur months ago.

_Was that part of the dream?_ he wondered. _Or was that reality? Because that was before the gunfire and the water. Possibly real._ But there was no actual way to tell, to separate the two. Maybe that had been a dream as well, and the fall into the water had only sent him deeper. He decided to stop dwelling on it, stop trying to figure it out. He would never know until he woke up.

They pulled over to park in the little dirt lot. A cow grazed in a pasture behind the market. In a paddock behind it, three alpacas lazed in the late morning sun.

"Eames, look," Arthur said, jerking his head toward them. "A cow. And some alpacas." 

So observant, his Arthur. 

A stocky woman with salt and pepper hair came from behind the green-painted market stall to greet them. She was wiping her hands on a dishrag. "Good morning, fellas. What can I do for you? Did you want to pet the cow, honey?" she asked Arthur. "She's friendly."

"I'm good, thanks," Arthur said. "Can I take a picture of your alpacas though?"

"Go right ahead."

"I'm going to get some greens," Eames said. 

Arthur nodded and took out his phone to snap a few pics. Eames had no idea what he was going to do with them. Print them, or what? He popped a toothpick into his mouth and picked up a basket to load up with actual food. 

The woman stepped behind the counter. The register was an old one, with no barcode scanner, the kind that rang when it opened. 

"You all are the Englishman who came in here last month or so," she said.

_A month or so..._ Did it feel like a month, or a minute? A month, it had to be. It had been late summer when they'd left, early September. Now it was mid-October.

"That's right," Eames said. He looked at a few things on the shelves as he shopped. Herbs and containers to grow them in, a few home-ground spices in little bags. Eco-friendly light bulbs, bags to put leaves into, hurricane lamps, scented candles, miniature pumpkins with faces painted on them. It smelled nice in here. He picked up a candle that smelled like cedar and put it into his basket.

Arthur came inside, flipping through his new photos on his phone. "Find anything to eat?" he asked.

Eames hefted his full basket at Arthur, and went to the register. Arthur stood beside him and showed him the pictures he'd taken, as if Eames hadn't just been outside looking at the actual things. Actually, Arthur had a pretty good eye for composition. Eames had only ever seen his surveillance photos before.

"You all are those two guys who bought that big blue house," the woman said.

Arthur's jaw dropped almost comically. He sputtered for a few seconds, visibly losing his composure. Eames tried to stifle a laugh, but in the end he couldn't. It was too glorious, the "off the grid", one hundred percent "safe house," deep in the woods at the foot of a mountain - a mythical retreat that no one would ever locate, nor even acknowledge its existence.

"I'm sorry, that's supposed to be a secret," she said. "You're those special agents who were in the newspaper after the shootout, you boys. I hope your cover didn't get blown. No one here will tell a soul, that's for sure."

"Umm," Arthur said. "No, that's... it's okay. We're not undercover agents or anything. I mean, we're... yeah, we're agents but we're not undercover. It's not like that."

She smiled as she tapped in the prices by hand. "Well, that's good. I'm glad someone finally bought that old thing; it was set to be torn down and I've always liked it. You're gonna need a new roof up there, you know. And you might want to talk to a few local people when the winter comes, just to let them know you're up there. It snows pretty heavy sometimes and no one has plowed Autumn Road for years."

Arthur's shock before was nothing compared to Eames's now. He felt his own jaw drop; the toothpick fell out of his mouth. He sputtered as he bent to pick it up off the floor.

"What did you call it?" Arthur asked.

"That's Autumn Road up there. Used to be marked by a road post, but it's long gone. That's your mailing address though. I don't think there's a number on the house, but even if there was, there's only one house up there anyways."

"Autumn Road?" Eames asked, just to be sure. 

"Oh, you've definitely come at the right time if you want to see why," she said. 

Arthur turned to Eames and said, "We must have seen that written somewhere while we were researching it. We both looked at a lot of old maps. We probably saw it and forgot, but got it stuck in our heads. That's all."

"Yes, of course," Eames said.

"Another thing you all want to do is get some secure trash bins," she went on, "bungee them closed, or keep all your trash in the pantry till you're ready to bring it to the dumps. You don't want to draw any of the wildlife up there, they make a mess of things. And I'd get that chimney cleaned out too, because there's probably decades worth of nesting in there and you'll smoke yourselves out the first time you light a fire. And get a carbon monoxide detector. It's a great old house, but you want to be safe."

Arthur was still staring at him. He blinked when he realized the woman was still talking. "Right," he said. "Yeah, I hadn't thought of that."

"You're a city boy, aren't you? Probably never had a big old place like that?"

"Not one that I had to look after," Arthur said. "So yeah. Thanks for the tips."

_Now or never,_ Eames thought, and asked her, "Where would one go to get married around here?"

Arthur's jaw dropped again, and he stared at Eames, wide-eyed and not even trying to hide it.

"Aww!" the woman said. "That's so sweet. Well, that depends. Do you all want to get married in a church?" 

_Chuch,_ it sounded like. Eames filed her accent away where he kept every accent he heard. "No, that's not necessary. Just need to make it official."

"Well honeys, I'm a village justice up here. So whenever you're ready, you just bring all your documents to city hall and I can do the honors myself, if you want. My name is Darlene, by the by. Darlene Riley."

Eames shook her hand. "Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Riley. I'm Jacob Hartley. This is Alex Goodman." He stood aside to let Arthur shake her hand, too.

"Goodman-Hartley, now that has a ring to it that I like. Oh, have you got rings? And of course, Mr. Hartley, I'll need your naturalization records and such. I'll need birth certificates, census records, passports and what-have-you from both of you all."

"I can put those together within a few days," Eames said. It would give him something to do, at least, forging those things. 

"Then whenever you two are ready, all right? You come on up to town hall. Make sure you write down what you want to say, have your rings ready and anything else you'd like to add. I've got an iPod player if you have a wedding song you prefer. It takes a day for your license to go through, so be prepared to come see us twice."

Arthur was somewhere between total humiliation and amusement. His cheeks were pink and he looked like he was fighting not to laugh. To Darlene, Eames suspected, he probably just looked like he was bashful and glowing.

"That is very kind of you," Eames said. "We'll get started as soon as we're settled in."

She put all of his groceries into two green canvas bags. "These bags are free, all right? Because you're so nice and you all just made my day. Bring them back each time and you get ten cents off."

"Lovely." Grinning, Eames took the bags in one arm, and Arthur in the other. "See you soon!" he called over his shoulder.

Outside, Arthur said, "What just happened?" 

"I couldn't even tell you. Let's get back to the house though. I'm famished."

Arthur got into the driver's seat. He looked confused, with that little whorl between his eyebrows. Before pulling out of the dirt lot, he turned to Eames. "We're getting married," he said. "Married. We're getting married. Me and you."

"That's right. You're the one who asked."

"Yeah. It's just weird, saying the word. It stops making sense after a few times."

Eames leaned across the seat and kissed him. "Everything does."

Arthur tilted his head like he was considering it, and finally accepted it with a shrug. He pulled out of the lot, the car kicking up dust behind them.

It was only twenty minutes to the house, and a few through-town traffic lights. Yet Arthur could not seem to get there fast enough. He shouted, "MOVE, MOTHERFUCKER," at anyone who didn't gun it the second the light went green. "God damn it, people here drive like fucking morons."

"You're just not used to drivers not being psychotic," Eames said. "This is not the city. You're going to have to slow down. And apparently, when people are crossing the street here, you have to stop for them."

Arthur shot him a glance but kept driving.

"We should sell the house," Arthur said a few minutes later.

"What the fuck," Eames said. "We just got it. I went through a lot of bullshit to find it."

"But we're exposed here. People know we live up there. Sometimes."

Eames sighed. "That's going to happen everywhere. We are not, in fact, invisible. Everywhere we go, we're going to need to go into towns to buy food, supplies. We're going to need running water and other things that civilized people need to live. We're never going to be completely under the radar. It's not possible. That's a fantasy."

"But we've already been shot at here. What if someone else got hurt? Everywhere we go there's trouble."

"Well that's exactly the point," Eames said. "It's not going to change. Anywhere we go, we are a liability. Together or apart, people who don't want us alive, or who want something we have, are going to be an issue."

"But the people here are nice," Arthur said.

"Then by all means, lead me to the place where everyone is a dirty pedophile and murderer. That's where we'll stay to lie low; that way, we can just use them as human shields. Arthur, we've got to take what we can get. The best we can do is keep civilians out of danger. Anywhere."

Arthur sighed but didn't answer. It was as close to conciliatory he was going to get in the face of reason.

After a few minutes, paved roads gave way to dirt roads. Carefully planted and cultivated oaks and maples tangled into natural chaos. Shrubs became brush and weeds. 

Arthur turned onto the hidden path – Autumn Road. 

The trees that lined this path in the summer had turned to gold. Not just gold, but yellows so bright they were almost blinding, pumpkin orange, wine red. The afternoon sun set all the colors ablaze.

Arthur pulled over and stopped. "Holy shit," he said. Then he got out of the car, taking his phone out of his pocket again.

Eames joined him by the side of the road, as Arthur snapped a few pictures. He put his arm around Arthur's waist. Arthur leaned into him.

"So, we're staying, then?" Eames asked.

"Yeah," Arthur said. "We're staying."

** ** ** **

It wasn't as boring as Eames thought it would be. In fact, it was like most any other down-time he'd had, when he needed to lie low and cover his tracks for a while. He went back to work on documents, putting together some naturalizations papers, a new passport or two, and some new photo IDs. Arthur spent a lot of time on his laptop. He said he was keeping track of the dream boards, and while Eames was sure that a lot of information was going through there, he highly suspected that Arthur was mostly just amused by them.

Arthur got some emails and documents from Cobb about Fiona's progress. It was interesting and Eames was glad to hear that she seemed to have adjusted, but mostly he just felt profoundly settled about the whole thing. They had done their part, and whatever happened next, happened. 

The forging was taking him a while, but maybe he was stalling a bit, too. That they were just pieces of paper, and falsified ones, at that. He kept glancing at Arthur as he moved through the house or sat at the kitchen table. Arthur needed a desk, that's what he needed. Where he could sit up straight and not slump his shoulders. 

The fifth night was exciting. He was working in the dining room, his makeshift studio, when a bang and crash from outside shattered his almost meditative peace. He was up in a heartbeat, gun drawn, back pressed against the wall, out of sight of any windows. Arthur peered around the doorway from the kitchen, gripping his Glock. He signaled to Eames toward the pantry in the back, where the sound had come from. Eames made his way across the wall to where Arthur stood in the doorway.

Arthur shut the kitchen light and signaled that Eames should take the left side of the door. Arthur would take the right, and then once outside, they would cover each side back to back. 

Arthur unlocked the door slowly, but it still clicked. Eames held up three fingers and counted down. On three, they threw the door open and flung themselves outside, prepared to shoot.

They didn't have a back porch, just a small, cracked patio where they kept trash bins. Both bins were knocked over, their contents spilled. The sound of something lumbering away trailed off into the woods behind them.

"Wildlife?" Arthur whispered, crouching down to inspect the torn up bags.

"Likely," Eames said. It did seem a bit much for an enemy to go through the trouble of pretending to be wildlife in order to ambush them. They probably would have just gotten on with it. A terrifying thought occurred to him. "What if it was a bear?"

Arthur holstered his gun. "It was probably just a raccoon. There are these little claw marks all over the plastic, see?" He used his phone to light the evidence. 

"I guess we will need to get better trash bins," Eames said. "I suppose I can get them tomorrow. I need to go out anyway. I'm out of ink."

And he needed to get the fuck out of this house for a bit. Five days was long enough to be cooped up in here. Even though he'd hidden out for much longer than this, in much smaller spaces. 

"As I'm going out tomorrow," he added, "do you want me to pick anything up for you?"

"I need a jump drive," Arthur said. "And two paintball sets."

"Right, then I'll just... Paintball sets?"

Arthur shrugged. "We have the whole woods behind us. We can play paintball when we get bored. It'll keep us sharp."

That was Arthur's excuse for all of the things he found joy in when he wasn't working: running, working out, video games, sparring. They all "kept him sharp." 

"You want us to play paintball." 

"Yeah," Arthur said.

"In the woods out there."

"Yeah. Not at night. Maybe at dusk though."

They had played once or twice in the past. Arthur was a competitive bastard and he hated to lose. With no rules, there was no way to cheat - not that Arthur would, because he was fair to a fault.

And Eames was bored as hell; he might as well take out his frustrations on Arthur. He had seen a Sports Authority store somewhere around here. 

"Yeah, all right," he said.

So the next day he spent wandering around the same set of stores he'd wandered with Arthur when they'd first come up. He had planned on spending the entire day, but it got dark earlier these days and he found himself wanting to get back to the house sooner, so they would still have enough light. Besides, the stores already had Christmas decorations up, and Halloween hadn't even come and gone yet. That irritated him and he hurried out once he was done.

When he got back the the house and unloaded the car, he found Arthur waiting in the kitchen, already dressed to go outside. He wore an old, stained sweatshirt and bluejeans that looked pristine by anyone else's standards, but Arthur was obviously willing to sacrifice them.

Arthur started tearing the equipment on the table out of its packaging. "Get yourself ready, Mr. Eames. I'm going to stalk you through the woods. I'm going to ambush you, I'm going to win, and then I'm going to fuck you all over this house."

Eames raised his eyebrows. "Are you now, you oversexed trollop?" 

"I am."

"We'll see."

It ended up going nothing like either of them had planned. 

The game began normally enough—if he were to count Arthur yelling "You better run, Eames, because I'm hungry like the wolf," before sprinting off as "normal." Arthur went towards the pond, but that was too obvious for him, wasn't it? Eames knew he was going to double back, because he had worked with this twat for years and knew all of his tricks.

Eames thought for sure that he had him when he hoisted himself up into a tree and scanned the clearing west of the pond. There was movement from some low lying brush, and sure enough, out popped Arthur's pretty little head. Eames, perched on a branch and holding on with his thighs, waited until he stood completely before taking aim.

But Arthur's Eames-sense kicked in and he looked up in time. He dodged behind a tree, then peered around to take his own shot. 

Eames felt like a treed cat. He scrambled down quickly, and Arthur's shot hit the trunk of the tree as Eames fled toward the pond.

Arthur was really fucking fast, that was the thing. Adrenaline burned through Eames as Arthur pursued him. It was exhilarating - holy shit, he was afraid, he was afraid of _Arthur_ and that was very, very hot.

As soon as he'd slipped Arthur's line of sight, he pressed himself behind another tree and breathed deeply, quietly. The duck pond was before him, dark grey in the dying light. He would hear Arthur approach, then he would leap out, and open fire. Arthur was stealthy, but he wasn't _that_ stealthy.

Except he was, because his arm shot out from behind the tree and snagged Eames's jacket. Eames yelped in alarm and spun to face him. 

They grappled for Eames's rifle as Arthur tried to disarm him. Neither of them were fucking around. They both wanted to win and they were both high on adrenaline. 

Eames leg-swept him and pinned one hand. Arthur tried to bring his own rifle up with the other hand but Eames batted it away. He had lost his own weapon in the tussle and there was no way to retrieve it. Letting go of Arthur's wrists would be a fatal miscalculation, one he wasn't going to make.

Arthur may have been fair to a fault, but Eames wasn't. At a loss, he slotted his thigh between both of Arthur's and pressed forward.

"Oh, you fucking _cheat_ ," Arthur spat out. "That's not even combat, you, you fucking..." He swallowed hard and the twisting and bucking he'd been doing to get out of Eames's grip changed. "Is that how you win all your battles, Eames?" he panted. "Just climb on top of your enemy?" 

Eames grinned and just kept grinding on him. "Just the ones who are oversexed trollops. God, you're so easy." He leaned down to bite at Arthur's neck. "The quickest way to victory has always been in your trousers, Arthur. Perhaps if you weren't so randy all the time, you'd stand a chance. But no, this is all it takes for you." He risked letting go of Arthur's wrists to reach down and slip his hand into Arthur's bluejeans. It was a tight fit, but Arthur didn't seem to mind. He arched up into the touch, his rifle forgotten.

Eames hadn't forgotten, though. He gave him a few rough strokes, removed his hand from Arthur's trousers, and reached for one of the fallen rifles. 

Arthur flipped them before he got to it. Eames threw him, and was quick enough to get to his feet. Arthur leapt up, got hold of one rifle, and Eames grabbed the other.

They stood facing each other, taking aim. Arthur looked ridiculous and he was sure he did, too, horny as fuck and covered in dirt and leaves, holding a paintball rifle and not pulling the trigger.

Arthur could run. He could turn and flee and the game would be back at square one. But it was getting dark now, and cold enough that Eames couldn't feel his nose.

"Draw?" Eames said.

Arthur narrowed his eyes. "If I put my weapon down you'll still shoot. Come on, how long have I known you? There's no such thing as a draw with Mr. Eames."

Apparently Arthur hadn't known him long enough, because there were other things he liked better than winning at paintball, one of which was winning at fucking Arthur. So Eames put his weapon down first and held both hands up, counting on Arthur's sense of fair play.

Arthur dropped his rifle and practically pounced on Eames, backing him up against the tree he'd dodged behind earlier. Arthur's wandering hands ran under his clothes, tugged at his flies, jerked him closer. His mouth was hot all over Eames's neck, and when he pulled back to speak, his eyes held a half-lidded, arrogant challenge which was typical of Arthur aggressively making sex eyes at him. He looked like he wanted to say something profound, or profoundly sexy, but all that came out was, "Fuck, you're so hot."

Eames laughed and attacked his lips. Arthur shoved his cold hand into his pants – so much for fair play. Eames bit him and told him he was a son of a bitch.

Movement from somewhere around the pond caught his eye and he froze. Arthur must have felt his reaction, or possibly heard a sound, because he stopped moving, too.

It was a low, dull, *thump thump* sound that Eames heard, followed by the crunch of leaves as something tread on them. It was hunting season, maybe. He didn't know. How foolish of them to be running around out here if it was.

"What the fuck?" Arthur whispered into his neck.

Eames, still backed up against the tree, looked past Arthur's shoulder. 

It came through the trees just as Arthur turned to look behind him. Impossibly large, black, and lumbering on four enormous feet. It snuffled at the pine needles and prodded at something on the ground, making a snorting noise. Not a hunter. Not a fucking _raccoon._ A giant motherfucking deadly black bear.

Eames felt his entire body turn cold. All the blood fled from his innards to his arms and legs. His body told him, _Run, motherfucker, run for your life_ , but he couldn't move.

Arthur was as quiet as he was, pressed against him and shaking with the urge to flee.

"Don't move," Arthur said. "It's all right. It doesn't know we're here yet but it can probably smell us; their sense of smell is better than their vision."

Of course Arthur would know about bear senses; he had probably researched all of this before coming up here.

"I researched all of this before coming up here," Arthur said. "All we need to do is – oh. Now it's seen us."

Eames gripped Arthur's hips as if he were a totem, then stopped to think he should move Arthur aside, throw him to the ground and cover him, or take his hand and run. But Arthur would not move. 

"The web page said that when the bear looks at you you're supposed to let it know you're human so it doesn't attack you. We can't run; they're too fast. If it charges we have to climb a tree. But they're not that aggressive."

"What if it has cubs around?" Eames whispered.

"Then we're in trouble. But I don't think so. Don't look it in the eye, though." Arthur turned away and pressed his back to Eames's front, his hands held up. 

That was when it occurred to Eames that Arthur was shielding him with his body. That if the animal charged at them, he'd be on the front line. Eames wasn't having that. He put his hands on Arthur's waist to move him away.

"Don't touch me," Arthur whispered. 

The bear tilted its head at them and made a noise that sounded strangely questioning. It might have been comical if it wasn't terrifying. Arthur tensed in front of him and instinctually tried to back away, but ended up just pressing Eames further into the tree.

"Hello," Arthur choked out. 

Eames thought he'd gone mad.

"We're people," he continued in a soft voice. "So just... just go away. Please."

The bear continued to study them for what felt like a few hours, but was probably really about fifteen seconds. Then it stood up on its hind legs, bigger than any living thing he'd ever seen that wasn't in a cage. Arthur gasped and reached back to grab his hand. Eames could smell fear on him, on both of them, and he thought the bear probably could, too. It tilted its head this way and that, as if trying to get a better look at them.

"It's okay," Arthur said, though his voice was shaking. "It's just curious."

The bear took a long look at them, then went back down on four feet and continued snuffling along the ground as if it wasn't really fussed by them after all. It yawned, a loud, yawping sound that reminded Eames of Chewbacca from Star Wars.

"We're going to back away slowly," Arthur said, "and then make a lot of noise on our way back to the house. This way it'll know not to follow us."

"Are you sure that's..."

"Yes," Arthur said. He kept his back to Eames as he nudged him away from the tree, walking backwards with his hands up even though the bear seemed to be finished looking at them.

When they were completely out of its sight, Arthur took his phone out and picked a song at random just to make noise. It was "Funeral March of the Marionettes," which Eames knew better as Alfred Hitchcock's theme. He burst into near-hysterical laughter. Arthur looked at him like he was mad for a moment before laughing along with him.

When they were close enough to the house, they both ran. 

The pantry door swung shut behind them with a bang. Eames felt out of breath and shaky even though he'd only run a few hundred meters; excess adrenaline surged through him. Arthur, still laughing, threw himself at Eames, kissing like a madman and shoving him into the kitchen.

Eames tried, he really did. Especially when Arthur's hand went back into his pants. But every time he closed his eyes all he could see was that huge, black beast staring at him. The countertop was digging into his arse and the kitchen was too dark.

"What's the matter?" Arthur asked, breathless and bright-eyed. 

"The matter?" Eames asked. "A bear is the matter!"

Arthur pulled back, confused. "Yeah but it's gone now. And, come on, that was intense."

Eames sputtered for a few seconds and started to feel uncomfortable in Arthur's grasp. "Intense! I had my willy out and a bear came into the picture! Do you know what could have happened!"

Arthur stared at him for a second before breaking down into laughter. 

"It's not funny, Arthur. A bear saw my cock. It might never get hard again." Arthur's laughter was maybe a tad contagious, but Eames refused to see the humor in the situation. 

Arthur laughed until his cheeks were pink, beating his fist against Eames's shoulder like he couldn't control himself. "Okay," he said, trying to catch his breath. "No, okay, you're right." He pulled himself together for the briefest of moments before dissolving into laughter again. "No, I'm sorry, you're right, that was really scary," he said. But his voice was still shaking with restrained laughter. "I mean, yeah, that was totally dangerous. We could have died. It could have killed us. With its bear hands." 

Eames just watched him double up in mirth, hands braced on his thighs, laughing until his diaphragm seized and he couldn't breathe. _'Bear hands_ ' indeed. 

Arthur, trying to talk down a bear seconds after pulling his hand from Eames's trousers. The look on the bear's face when he had addressed it. And Eames telling him that a bear had killed his boner for life.

The laughter hit him unexpectedly and soon he was doubled up, too, bracing on the counter and wiping at his eyes. Arthur gave up and sat on the kitchen floor, trying to get himself under control. Eames slid down across from him and fought for breath. He was laughing so hard now he was getting thirsty. 

Eames had faced down gunmen, had dodged IEDs, had walked through dreams, run across the top of a train, trekked through Siberia, nearly been hanged, had actually been tortured. And nothing had rendered him as immobile with fear as a huge black bear trying to figure out what the fuck he and Arthur were doing in the woods.

And Arthur, ridiculous Arthur standing in front of him, a human shield. There was no one else on the entire planet who would have thought to do that. Eames's own Mum and Dad would have said, _'You're on your own, old chum._ '

Arthur loved him. He _loved_ him. It wasn't about having someone to look after his estate when he was gone, or pull the plug if he was shitting himself in a hospital with no hope for return. Arthur wanted him around, Arthur thought so highly of him that he'd take a bear claw to the gut if it meant Eames didn't have to. And if that was a dream, he would take it over any other reality. He understood Cobb a little bit better.

Arthur was still laughing when Eames crawled over to him, pushed him down onto the hardwood floor, and stretched out on top of him. 

"What," Arthur said, surprised out of laughter. "I thought your libido was gone for good?"

"I got better," Eames said.

"Thank god."

This time, Eames took the time to undo Arthur's button and flies. "Would you stay with me anyway? If the bear had ruined me for eternity?"

Arthur focused, placed a hand on his chest, and braced himself on his elbows. "Are you asking me a serious question here? Do you think I'd leave if we couldn't fuck?"

"Well, not _leave_ , but... Let's just say sex became impossible. All of it. I couldn't even do this to you." He worked Arthur out of his trousers and pants. 

"I... Yes, dumbass. What the fuck? I mean I'd be." He stopped to swallow dryly and catch his breath. "I'd be sad. But it's not just this. It's you. You could be anything and I'd. You could be butt-ugly and I'd still. I'd still."

Eames wanted to crush him and pull his hair and give him all the kisses his mouth was asking for, but first he said, "Tomorrow. Let's do it tomorrow."

Arthur shook his head. "No, fucker, what the hell, now, let's do it now."

Eames laughed, kissed him, and laughed again. "Not this, you twat, the marriage thing. Let's do that tomorrow."

Arthur frowned as if this was the dumbest and yet most obvious thing he'd ever heard. "Okay, whatever. Yeah, good. Come on, Eames. Before the bear comes back."

Eames gave Arthur what he wanted. In the end, he usually did.

** ** ** **

It took them more than a day. It took a trip to the city for suits (Eames insisted on doing it nicely,) and for rings (neither cared for anything fancy.) It took a day for the license with fake names to be processed. Then they had to wait until a slot opened up in city hall.

Eames didn't feel any nerves or jitters. Nothing unusual was happening, after all. He had been with Arthur exclusively for years. Sharing some rights to access parts of each other's lives legally was just another step. Eames didn't think much of marriage outside of that anyway. Arthur would fight a bear for him, and that was really all that mattered.

Arthur hardly mentioned it, either. But when it was time to go, and Eames came out of the bathroom dressed in his suit—a black one that Arthur had picked out--Arthur stared. He didn't say anything, just stared until Eames started to feel self conscious.

"What?" he asked. 

"You just... you look so good, I don't know how I managed to, I don't know. Get you, I guess."

Eames had chosen gun-metal grey for Arthur (if Arthur got to choose his suit, then he got to choose Arthur's.) "Don't start that again," Eames said. "I love you for your looks, all right?"

Arthur strode toward him. Eames thought for a second that he was going to start pawing at the suit to get him out of it and make them late, but he didn't. He marched him back into the bathroom and turned him toward the mirror. 

"Look," Arthur said, standing behind him. "I mean, yeah, you've always been intelligent and creative, and all that other shit, and yeah, we work well together and I wouldn't want to have anyone else watching my back, blah blah blah. But Jesus Christ, Eames. You're actually beautiful; it's ridiculous. You could have anyone."

"I don't want..."

"I know," Arthur said, "you don't want anyone. It's just, sometimes I look at you and I remember that you're hot, too."

"I'm going to get old and wrinkled and paunchy just like anyone else."

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Which is why it's good that you're also badass and smart and all that other stuff. Look, I know we talked about this before." He held Eames's eyes in the mirror. "But I want you to understand it before we go walking in there. Vows are stupid. No one can promise anything for sure, and it's naïve to think you can really ever know another person totally. You can still destroy someone even if you love them. You can destroy someone _because_ you love them. If you ever decide you don't want to be with me anymore or if this arrangement isn't working out, or..."

"Arthur..."

"Let me say it." Arthur squeezed his bicep, and didn't look away from his eyes in the mirror. "If you get a better deal. If there's ever anyone else who would be a better partner, or if you just get tired of me or whatever, all I ask is that you tell me. And I'll tell you, okay? That's one thing I can promise you. To the best of my ability, I'll never betray you. I'll always be fair, when it comes to that."

"'Fair' is your nature," Eames said. "Admittedly, it's not mine. But I'll give you the same thing. Yes, even if we change. But you've got to know that I can't foresee that day."

"That doesn't mean it's impossible."

"Of course not. But, Arthur, before we walk into that building, I need you to know that this isn't a one-sided thing, yeah? We spend more time apart than we do together, and that's not likely to change any time soon. I suppose we don't get many chances to actually say these things, so I'm saying them today. Make sure you believe them. Yes, it's all good and practical to have a partner that you trust enough to take over your life, should you not be able to care for yourself. But I wouldn't rather have mine be anyone else. All right?"

Arthur let go of the breath he'd been holding the entire time. "All right. Cool. Let's go."

So it was that a week before Halloween, they got into their stolen car and drove to City Hall.

The biggest surprise was that they weren't the only ones there. Eames didn't know why he hadn't foreseen that. Rather stupid of both of them, really. There were a few other couples there, waiting their turn inside the plain, square, colonial building. Men in black tuxes, women in white dresses. And their families. Parents, siblings, flower children.

"Fuck," Arthur said. 

"It's all right, fake names," Eames murmured. "And no pictures. We're fine. Smile and act normal."

Apparently smiling and acting normal were mutually exclusive to Arthur when he was tense like this. Eames took his arm and led him to one of the benches that lined the marble hall. One of the brides stared openly at them. This was another thing Eames hadn't expected, not after all this time. Eames stared back, utterly blank, until she flushed and looked away. No one had ever won a staring contest with him; their shame always kicked in, and he prided himself on having next to none.

Finally, the wooden, double doors opened and Darlene Riley poked her head out. 

"All right, you all! We're ready to start. I've got Jacoby-Berger first, Hanish-Hill second, Ingstram-Giovanni third, Goodman-Hartley fourth, and Baller-Welle fifth."

Eames felt rather than heard Arthur suppress his laugh. Then Arthur nudged his ribs with his elbow and whispered, "Baller-Welle" as if Eames hadn't heard the same thing. Christ, he was marrying a fourteen year old. He bit down on his lip to keep from laughing.

The bride who had been staring at them stood up and said, "I don't think today is a good day for me. I'd like to reschedule." She glanced at them, at Darlene, and then at her fiance, who looked mortified.

"Then reschedule, Miss Baller," Darlene said.

Beside him, Arthur curled his hands into fists. Not out of anger, but suppressed amusement. He must have thought it perfect that she was part of the joke.

"That brings us down to four today," Darlene went on. "Gives us a bit more time to celebrate." She smiled, and winked in their direction.

"Fuck," Arthur said again, under his breath. "Celebrate. _Fuck._ " But he smiled at her anyway, through gritted teeth, and nodded in acknowledgement. 

Miss Baller took her sputtering fiance by the hand, rounded up her family, and hustled them out the door in a flurry of indignation.

"Anyone else?" Darlene chirped. "No? All right, then let's get started." She called the first couple in with their family.

After about a half an hour, they hadn't come back out, but Darlene opened the doors and called the second couple in.

Arthur looked at Eames, alarmed. "Maybe they're all going out the back door? That's what we should do."

"Maybe this is all a sinister small-town ruse," Eames said, "and they're all locked in an abattoir, awaiting slaughter."

"Maybe it's a portal to another dimension," Arthur said.

Eames thought, _'Maybe they're projections and we don't need to see them anymore,_ ' but he kept that to himself. Instead he said, "Maybe the next room hosts a mandatory wedding orgy."

"Just make sure you Baller-Welle," Arthur said.

Eames laughed so loud that he startled the last couple. "Terribly sorry," he said. 

The next couple went in, and then, after over an hour, Darlene opened the doors again and said, "And finally! Goodman-Hartley. Come on in, boys, I've got your paperwork all ready."

Eames thought it only right to take Arthur's hand as they walked through the doors and into the official room. It smelled of carpet cleaner and drama. There were white streamers that looked like toilet paper, and little cardboard bells hanging around her podium, but this did little to offset the impersonal feel of the room.

An old man stood behind the podium, dressed in a uniform and wearing a Glock on his hip. It was the man Eames had bought groceries from on his first day up here. 

"Oh, hey," Arthur said, "Mr. Riley. I met you on the road that day."

"Yuh," the man said. "My daughter and I keep two jobs, see. One at the market and one here."

"He's your witness, all right?" Darlene asked as she took her place behind the podium. "You all nervous?"

"A little," Arthur said.

"You have everything, right? Your rings, and whatever you want to say?"

"Say?" Arthur asked. "I thought you were going to do the whole 'do you take so and so' thing?"

"Well, I could," she said. "And I could read Corinthians. But I figured you might want to say your own vows."

Eames was fine with that; he could whip up something clever and sweet to say without giving it too much thought. He wasn't so sure about Arthur. "I'm fine with just sticking to the basics," Eames said. "The whole 'I so-and-so take you so-and-so' etcetera. We're not good public speakers. You don't have to read anything else."

"Whatever makes you comfortable," Darlene said. "Got your rings?"

Eames couldn't help noticing how Arthur's hand shook when he took the ring out of his pocket. Arthur was silly sometimes and Eames wanted to kiss him sillier. 

"Then let's make this as easy as pie," she said, clearly thinking that Arthur was such a dear. "Alls you have to do is repeat what I say. Quick and painless." She turned to Eames and said, "I, Jacob Hartley, take you, Alex Goodman, to be my husband."

Eames could have done it by heart. "I, Jacob Hartley, take..."

"Wait," Arthur said. He pressed shaking fingertips to Eames's mouth. "Wait a second, no. Hold on. _Eames._ "

"What?" Eames said, grabbing his hand and moving it away so he could speak. What the fuck was Arthur playing at, with using his real name? Or, not his _real_ name, but the one everyone knew him as. The one _Arthur_ knew him as.

"It's just us," Arthur said, his voice low. "And them." He nodded towards the Rileys. "They're not going to... I think it's okay. It's still legal. Say 'Arthur.' Please." 

Stunned, Eames looked from Arthur to Darlene. He cleared his throat. "Erm. Is that all right? If we use the names we met under? Not on paper, obviously, the papers are all official, but we've had some name changes due to the covert nature of our work."

"You can say whatever words you like. As long as the paperwork is legal."

He turned back to Arthur. "In that case, I, Thomas Eames, take you, Arthur Arceneau..."

Those weren't their birth-names, but they were as real as anything was bound to get. He had always just been "Eames" to Arthur, as Arthur had never been anyone but "Arthur" to him. 

He put a ring onto Arthur's finger, and Arthur put one onto his. 

Darlene turned to Arthur and said, "Oh my, do you all _really_ call your husband by his last name?"

"My..." Arthur stuttered.

"Yes, honey, your husband, I know it's shocking, but that's why you came here today. Go on, kiss each other!"

They did. Aside from the fact that two people were watching, it didn't feel any different. Arthur felt the same to him as he always had.

Mr. Riley ushered them out the side doors of the official looking room. They weren't taken to an abattoir, an alternate dimension, or a mandatory orgy. Instead, the open, marble room with arched doorways hosted a small wedding reception area. The other couples and their families mingled, chatting happily, taking photographs on phones and digital cameras, hugging, kissing, laughing.

"Holy shit," Arthur whispered. "Cameras." When he turned to Eames, his eyes were nearly outside of his head. Arthur had never seemed so afraid of cameras and the public before. He was just having a minor panic, that was all, one that Eames could easily deflect.

"Just stay out of their line of sight," Eames said. "We've always been good at not being photographed in public situations. Today is no different. This is just another job with a high-profile to-do and you're Alex Goodman."

"Right," Arthur said, his shoulders dropping a bit.

And then Darlene came out wheeling a trolley with a great sheet of white cake, the words "CONTRATULATIONS NEWLYWEDS" written on it in blue ice cream.

Arthur laughed beside him, slightly hysterically. Eames laughed, too.

"Congrats, everybody!" she called out. "Now I want you all to have a piece of this lovely cake so that I don't eat the whole darned thing myself. There's raspberry in the middle. But first, let's have all the newlyweds gather on the floor for your first dance."

"Fuck me dead," Arthur hissed.

"We can do this," Eames said, taking his hand. It wasn't that big of a deal. He'd danced in public before, sometimes with marks, sometimes with lovers, and once with a friend he'd been desperately, misguidedly in love with. For fucksake, he had been naked in public before. He'd hustled on the streets before turning to thievery. This was nothing. He could dance with Arthur in a small town, with a handful of people watching. After he'd just been married.

Old Man Riley plugged an iPod into a set of speakers and fiddled around with it. For a shivery second, Eames was certain that "Sh-Boom" was going to start playing. He inhaled his breath of relief when it didn't. 

He forgot to exhale.

" _Will you take part in  
My life, my love?  
That is my dream..._ "

Dion and the Belmonts asked plaintively. 

He stood under the marble arch with Arthur's hand in his, staring at him the way Arthur was staring back. He was sure his own face must look just as gobsmacked. 

Arthur snapped his mouth shut, shook off the shock, and smiled. He curled Eames's hand to his chest and slid the other around his waist. 

"It doesn't matter," he said. 

' _Life is but a dream, it's what you make it,_ ' the song said. 

Eames pulled Arthur to him, in more of an ambulatory embrace than actual dance, witnesses be damned. 

' _Life is but a dream,  
and I dream of you,  
strange as it seems..._ '

Arthur looked him in the eye. "Okay, so we did the legal thing, which is really just paperwork and can be undone just as easily as not using those names anymore. But I do actually need one real promise from you."

"More, Arthur?" Eames asked, only half teasing.

"It's important." He kept his voice low, drawing back only enough to let Eames see him, but still close enough to whisper. "One of us is going to die first. If it's me, don't decide it's all a dream and try to wake up."

"That's not fair," Eames said. This was completely outside of his expectations. But then, Arthur was good at doing that to him. "What if it is a dream? You'd want me to wake up."

"I don't care about fair when it comes to that. If it turns out I'm wrong, then I'll just wait topside for you. This is life, okay? Maybe it's all a dream, I mean everything, ever. Maybe it's supposed to be. But we're both here, we're both sentient, and it counts, okay? It counts. If you were convinced this was reality and I died, you'd still have something to live for, agreed?"

"Yes, of course."

"Well, this is reality," Arthur said. "And I can promise you the same thing. If you go first, I won't try to follow you. I'll wait my turn."

"As long as you're not a projection," Eames said. He could hang on without Arthur, as long as the man in front of him actually _was_ Arthur. And if not, then he was simply making a promise to his own projection, anyway. And who had to keep those?

"I'm not a projection, Eames. I'm as real as you are. You wouldn't create me like this. You know what Dom told me once, after the Fischer case? He almost chose to stay in limbo with the projection, you know. I actually kind of expected it, when he didn't come back out of the water. But later he said that he knew, all the way down to his balls, that it wasn't her."

"Really not in the mood to think about Cobb's balls," Eames said. He knew he was trying to deflect. As usual, Arthur wasn't letting him. This conversation was a bit too claustrophobic for him with the music and his own doubts playing in the background.

"He said that the dream was nothing compared to the reality of her. All her perfection and her flaws – he could never recreate her as she was. You're about as lucid a dreamer as they come, Eames. You're a forger. You can tell the difference between a projection and reality, you know exactly who I am, and you would not create me like this."

Something settled in him, then. If he couldn't believe in Arthur here, now, then where and when could he? "Right," he said, and pulled Arthur close again, so that he could look somewhere over his shoulder. "That's all right, then."

' _  
That is my dream  
Life is but a dream..._ '

** ** ** **

Eames awoke the next day to the sound of gunfire. He and Arthur leapt out of the bed, silent and wide awake. Eames probably should have been panicking, but wasn't. The room was cold, the floor freezing, but he noticed this only peripherally. 

They didn't have to speak. They didn't have to signal, either, but did so out of habit, Arthur gesturing towards Eames's gun on the bedside table, and then to the bedroom door. Arthur had his own gun and a pair of binoculars. He went to the window and parted the heavy curtain to the vague, dawn-ish light.

Eames didn't hear any footsteps or any movement in the house. The structure was so old, if someone was walking on the floorboards or up the stairs, there was no way to be silent. Whoever they were, they weren't in the house yet. Eames felt nothing but calm as he pushed the door open.

The gunshots sounded again, *POP POP POP POP!* Distant, but not _too_ distant. 

It brought him back to his childhood, hearing those somewhat far-off shotgun reports. All at once, he knew what it was and dropped his stance.

"It's all right," he said to Arthur.

Arthur lowered the binoculars and looked over his shoulder.

"What month is it, then?" Eames asked.

"October," Arthur whispered, frowning. "But what..."

"And that's the forest back there. With wildlife."

Arthur's frown deepened as he understood. "Oh. _Oh._ Yeah, that's true." He lowered his gun, but peeked out of the window again. He was still in his pajamas, wearing socks that he hadn't taken off for bed. 

*POP POP POP POP POP!* came the reports, followed by distant shouts.

Arthur closed the curtains and turned away. He dropped his gun on his bedside table and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. His hair was a mess. "They're probably shooting deer, I guess. It's illegal for them to shoot Rose."

"Rose?" Eames had to clear his mind and try to concentrate. Nothing was coming to him. He didn't know anyone named Rose.

"The bear," Arthur said, waving his hand and making his way into the adjoining bathroom. "It's illegal to hunt bears in New York. She's okay." He swung the door halfway shut behind him and used the loo.

"You named the bear Rose?" Eames asked. He was standing in the middle of a freezing bedroom in upstate New York, feet practically frozen to the floor, listening to Arthur, whom he had just married the day before, piss in the toilet and talk about a bear named Rose. He supposed that nothing would completely convince him he was awake. But then of course, life was such a strange ride, nothing could convince him he was dreaming, either. He heard Arthur yawn, run the water to wash his hands, and brush his teeth.

"Are you coming back to bed?" Eames asked.

"Yeah. Just a second."

Eames sat on the sheets—still scratchy and new, and now freezing, and pulled the stiff comforter over his legs. "Why Rose?" _Why did you name a bear at all?_ was probably what he should have asked, but this was Arthur, and he lived to shatter expectations.

Arthur came out of the bathroom shivering. "Isn't that the name of the girl in Dr. Who? And I figured you liked that show, so. Go brush your teeth if you want to make out or something. Fuck, it's cold. We need space heaters."

It seemed only moments ago the house had been an oven and Eames had brought an air conditioner for Arthur to install. He did as he was told and went into the bathroom.

Arthur kept muttering about the cold, how fucking fast it got cold up here, and how much he hated being cold and his feet were cold and he couldn't feel the tip of his nose, and on and on with the griping to himself while Eames relieved himself, washed up and brushed his teeth.

When he came out, Arthur was standing at the window again, peering out suspiciously as if he didn't quite believe the hunters weren't after him. "I better not see them cutting through this property," he said. "I don't want anyone walking around here. And I don't want to see any goddamn dead deer on sticks, or however they do it."

"You left out 'and stay off my damn lawn, you rotten kids,'" Eames said in Arthur's accent.

"Hmph," Arthur added to the conversation, scowling out the window. 

Eames studied his profile, and for a moment, for just an unimaginably brief second, saw Arthur standing at the same exact window, with the same exact curtains and the same exact expression on his face, only his hair was thin and white. Age spots marked the back of his hand, blue veins visible beneath papery skin. And then it was gone. Arthur was turning towards him, hair so dark it looked black in this light, tousled from sleep. His eyes were tired but alert, mouth pink from brushing his teeth. Eames stared at the curve of his bottom lip, unable to look away.

"We're definitely gonna need that kind of bed where it's two separate mattresses in the same frame if we're going to share this room," Arthur said, "because I want to get a bed heater and crank it to a thousand and I want my own blanket. And I want you to stay on your side of the bed and stop kicking me in the kidney, I almost pissed blood this morning. You're staring at me, Eames, and it's not in a sex kind of way."

"No," Eames said. His voice sounded hoarse and low in his ears. "It's in a sex kind of way." 

"Oh." Arthur went to get back into the bed.

Eames stopped him halfway with a hand on his arm, turning him around. It _was_ a sex kind of way that he was staring at Arthur, just not only sex. That vision of him, old and grey and wrinkled, staring out the window, still with a somehow stately beauty about him... Eames felt something take root in the vicinity of his guts, something that wasn't just love or sex, but longer than that. Something about childhood and adulthood and death and life again. As if he'd done this all before, from the beginning. He didn't know if that was because this was a dream, of if—as Arthur had suggested—because everything was, anyway.

"I'll have sex with you," Arthur said, "but I'm not gonna be on top because it's too cold. Or if I end up on top, my shirt is staying on, so if you maybe want to..."

Eames grabbed him around the shoulders and the waist, reeled him in, and practically crushed him. Arthur responded immediately to that, just like he always did, because he was fairly easy, after all.

"Or we could..." Arthur said, but Eames kissed him, because it didn't matter what they did.

It didn't matter, because this morning nothing mattered except that he had Arthur in his arms, here, now, in a moment that would never happen again, but which he would never lose. If this was life, he would take this into death. If it was a dream, he would take it into the waking world.

Arthur was always bringing up Cobb and Mal as an example of how people could hurt and betray each other, and Eames understood him, all at once. Arthur was gasping into his mouth, eager, cold hands running along his back, and Eames was having revelation after revelation. Arthur was right: this mattered. And he would never to do him what Cobb had done to Mal.

He took him to bed, covered him, warmed him from the inside out, made him sweat, and burn, and curse.

"Eames," Arthur said, over and over again, until his toes curled, his back arched, and his eyes rolled back. "Eames, Eames, Eames."

From that morning on, Eames didn't question anything that happened, no matter how strange, how unexpected. Their union was unexpected enough – nothing could out-strange that, not as long as he lived.

And the days, after that, rolled inexorably onward, spiraling out behind him like a wake, and pulling him inescapably forward.


	5. 4

Seven weeks after they had left behind Cobb, Ariadne, Saito, Fiona and Lauren, they took off their rings, boxed them up, tucked them away in the back of a drawer, and went their separate ways. Eames went back to Mombasa to see if work found him. It did. The crew who had wanted to hire him in Cairo found him again. They weren't bad, and the job was a cakewalk. It didn't pay well, but Eames wasn't worried.

He heard from Arthur briefly right before the holidays. He was back in New York City, in his tidy, spacious apartment in the Bronx. He said he liked it there because the cafes were good and people left him alone. Said he had a job coming up in Paris and would probably work with Ariadne on it.

He didn't see Arthur until the next year. They met again in New York in February for the Chinese New Year. Eames had a job there. He and Arthur stayed together for two days. They walked along Canal Street, where confetti covered the streets in layers, was shot out of tubes every few seconds, and streamed down from windows. He slept in Arthur's apartment, and then went back to work. Arthur went up to Vancouver for his next job.

He saw Arthur again in June. Eames needed to disappear for a few weeks, so he took five separate flights with a detour in Beijing, finally got to JFK, and drove up to the house, almost a year after the last time. 

As soon as he came in, Arthur leapt down from the top of the stairs where he'd been crouching in wait with his gun. He told Eames he hadn't expected him and had nearly shot his brains all over the wooden floors, which he had just sanded, god damn it. 

Arthur had gone up not to lie low, but to do some work on the house. After the floors, he had painted the sills, and tiled the bathroom. He asked Eames how long he was staying. Eames told him seven weeks. 

Arthur had another three weeks free.

They put their rings back on and spent the beginning of summer painting, scraping, spackling and cleaning. 

When Arthur had to go, Eames stayed on for the last four weeks and looked around the old barn every day, trying to figure out if it was worth it to even consider turning it into something. Maybe not, since he wasn't going to be up here long enough to do any major work. 

But maybe.

** ** ** **

Right before his fortieth birthday, he was working with a new team on an extraction, in Philly. It was a set up, and Eames escaped—narrowly--with a new scar to add to his collection. The bullet had grazed his arm; a few more inches would have meant surgery and months of rehab. As it turned out, he would rather have had the surgery and rehab than what happened next.

He could not make it to upstate New York to lie low. He got as far as New York City on a train when, while trying to text Arthur, the letters on his phone started appearing out of order. Drugged, then, and it was hitting him now, a few hours later. He couldn't remember what the name of the train station was. He was probably bleeding and someone would find him soon. He sent a text of garbled words and hoped that Arthur could make sense of them.

When Arthur texted him back, he couldn't understand what the letters meant. He found a bench and curled up on it, hoping that Arthur would get there before the people who'd drugged him would. And before the police found him.

He awoke some indeterminable time later to Arthur and some other person hauling him to his feet. Arthur's voice was clipped and nervous. Eames felt bad about that and then blacked out. He awoke again in a van, and they had to pull over while he vomited for what felt like hours, Arthur's hand on his back, on his forehead.

He opened his eyes in a bed, in a dimly lit room, with Arthur sitting by his side.

"Am I awake?" he asked.

A fleeting look of panic in Arthur's eyes, which he could make out even in the low light and through the haze of his vision. 

But Arthur said yes.

When he next came around, Yusuf was standing over him, fiddling around with a bag of fluid that was presumably attached to his wrist and pumping him full of fluids.

"Where is Arthur?" he managed to ask.

"Ah," Yusuf said. "There we are. Yes, much better. Can you feel that?" 

He felt something sharp against his finger.

"Yes. Where is Arthur?"

"Getting some sleep in the next room. Shall I get him?" 

Another pinpoint of pain at the tip of his other finger. He drew his hand back, annoyed. "No. Let him sleep. Only don't let them take him away again."

Yusuf looked concerned as he sat on the edge of the bed. "No one's taken him away, Eames. He's in the next room. There are still high levels of the toxin in your blood but we're managing. You're still having some trouble, however."

He drifted off to blackness again—or maybe to dreams that he couldn't remember—and then awoke confined and too hot.

"Shh," Arthur said. "Go back to sleep. It's okay."

He settled once he realized it was Arthur holding him. His face was pressed against Arthur's ribs and he could hear his heart beating. It sounded nice. Arthur's cool fingers stroked the back of his neck. 

"Awake?" Eames asked.

"Yes."

"They wouldn't let me keep your tie," Eames said.

Arthur's fingers stilled, and Eames went back to sleep.

It took forever to get back on his feet. Or at least a week and a half, anyway. When he could walk around the private, guarded hospital by himself for long periods of time, he thanked his old chap Yusuf and signed himself out. Arthur took him to the house upstate.

Something had slowed down in him, it felt like. Arthur kept saying that the toxin, the last job, the sickness, everything, had just "taken a lot out of him" but Eames felt something more. Something heavy in his body that hadn't been there before. A reluctance to move. Arthur tended to him with methodical, precise care, and practicality devoid of sentiment. Eames didn't want it any other way.

When Spring came, Arthur insisted on walking with him through the woods every day. He grew tired quickly.

"Maybe we'll see Rose," Arthur said.

"Let's hope we don't." He didn't feel up to the excitement. He didn't think he could run if he tried.

Arthur stayed with him for four and a half months, avoiding work, and amusing himself with books, the internet, movies, and games. When sex came back into their lives, it was not as vigorous as it had been, but it was still good. Eames started looking again at that barn, wondering what he could do with it. Arthur never looked like he was eager to leave, or impatient for Eames to get on with full recovery. He stayed until Eames could run again. 

And when Eames could run, he did.

** ** ** **

Saito hired the entire Fischer team—sans Cobb, who insisted on being totally legit--for his next job, a simple extraction. Being with Arthur was one thing; working with him, entirely another. As always, Arthur never came up with the original ideas, but tore down all Eames's ideas and then rebuilt them until they fit. It was irritating as all hell, but the sex was no less fabulous at night. 

Ariadne was quiet on this one. The tilt of her mouth was sad. Arthur asked her how she was, how Cobb and the kids were. She said everything was fine, with a strained smile. And then she changed the subject.

Later, in their ridiculously lush hotel, Arthur asked him, "Is it our business? I mean, maybe it's just like a normal downtime in a relationship, which isn't our business. But what if it's something more?"

They finished the job, and then the following Christmas, were both called to work in Portland. They spent a very tense holiday dinner with Cobb, Ariadne, and the kids. 

Phillipa was fifteen, bright and blond and not sullen at all. She played guitar and smiled at Eames like she always had, but with more caution and understanding. James was thirteen and into martial arts. They loved Ariadne well enough. They were all safe. Money was good. And yet, because he couldn't help looking inside people, Eames knew that something was wrong.

"It's probably not our business," Arthur said again, later. "Although, I said that with Mal, too."

When Arthur finally did ask Ariadne (he later told Eames,) she admitted to feeling stifled. She was still young and wanted to work, and the kind of work she did would bring unwanted attention to Cobb and his kids. That Cobb was wonderful, but their union was "unwise." Still, they were trying to work through it.

"Yeah," Arthur said to Eames afterward, "so pretty much not my business."

** ** ** **

When Eames was forty-two, he worked straight through for six months, until he was exhausted and had literally more money than he knew what to do with. He hadn't seen Arthur the entire time, though he had sent him a text on his thirty-ninth birthday. 

He thought about gambling some of the money away, as a diversion. In the end, he played a few thousand pounds and then got bored. He travelled to Sicily. He went skiing in Switzerland. He visited some old friends in Russia. There he laughed, and drank, and boxed. He stole some art for the fuck of it.

After that, he needed to disappear, and headed back to New York. It was Autumn.

He stopped at Riley's market. Darlene said, "Good heavens, I haven't seen you around here in a year or so. Work keeping you two busy? Where is Arthur?"

She called him _Arthur_ and not Alex. She hadn't forgotten the ceremony a few years ago. Strangely, it didn't bother him.

"Working in Paris again," Eames said. 

"That's a shame, you all don't get to see each other much."

Eames smiled and took his sacks of groceries. "We're used to it." 

She said, "Time goes awfully fast, Mr. Eames."

He drove up Autumn Road, under a canopy of brilliant colors. The driveway to the house had been cleared of brush again, which meant that Arthur had been up here within the last few months, or maybe even more recently. Perhaps Eames had just missed him.

He unpacked his groceries, set up his iPod, and listened to Rachmaninoff while he swept out the dust and cobwebs. As much as it made his skin crawl, he didn't kill any of the spiders. Arthur wouldn't have liked him to, and who knew, maybe Arthur even counted and catalogued them.

Again he found himself looking at that useless old barn, trying to mentally make the space work. This he did easily, but he wasn't by any means a builder, and he didn't know what he would need to begin. Still. How hard could it be?

The next day, he went to the Home Depot, and bought click-together wooden flooring, more than he thought he would need. He stopped at Riley's on his way up again. This time, Mr. Riley was there.

"What've you got there, some flooring?" he asked, peering outside to Eames's rented truck.

"Yes," Eames said, "I thought I'd hold onto it in case I get the opportunity to put it down in that old barn."

Riley laughed until he wheezed. "You're just gonna plunk it down there? You have to cement that floor, first!" _'See_ -ment', he said. "You thinking of doing a reno on that?"

"I don't know. Maybe?"

"Well listen," Riley said, "if you decide to do something up there, get a few local folks to help you. We've got a handful of good contractors looking for work and they can get it done. Come on up to me or Darlene if you decide to do it. You need that roof fixed, too, before you put anything down there. Meanwhile, don't open that flooring, and make sure you lay it flat."

"I will do," Eames said. "Thank you."

He left again for a few months. While he was on a job, Arthur texted him to say, ' _Why is there an extra floor on the kitchen floor?_

' _Don't know yet,_ ' Eames texted back. _'How RU?_ '

 _'Good. Miss you. Will be up here for a bit._ '

Eames didn't go and meet him there; he still had some work going on.

** ** ** **

They spent the summer of Eames's forty-third year together at the house. 

Eames got there first. He was standing inside the barn, again looking around, when he heard Arthur's car pull up. It was June, the sun was high and warm through the trees. He went outside to help Arthur with his bags, and maybe fuck him once they were inside the door.

Arthur looked exhausted and washed out. But what got Eames's attention was that his hair was about forty percent grey, about a centimeter at the roots. The rest was all dark brown, and curling until it was almost frizzy. But the salt and pepper was highly visible under the late-spring sun.

"Hey," Arthur said, as he opened the boot of his car to get his things. 

Eames took him by the arm and pulled him around for a kiss. He couldn't help testing the texture of Arthur's hair with his fingertips as he did so. It felt like the same hair, slightly coarse, but easy to comb his fingers through. 

Arthur pulled away, smiling a little, and said, "Yeah, I haven't had a chance to dye it yet. I usually keep on top of it, but it's been a hell of a month."

"I never had any idea that you dyed your hair."

"Have since my twenties," Arthur said. "I started going grey really young. Does it make me look old?"

"No," Eames told him truthfully. He pictured what Arthur would look like in a few years, if he stopped coloring it. Probably like a mad scientist. He kind of wanted to see it.

He did fuck Arthur once they got in the door, too.

At the end of the month, they both went to see the Rileys and talked about making something of that barn. A studio, maybe, where they could work, or where Eames could paint something if he wanted to. Sometimes he still felt the odd itch to create something of his own instead of copying things. Might be fun.

By mid-summer, trucks were pulling up their drive, loaded with roofing, two-by-fours, cement, and sheetrock.

Arthur seemed to really enjoy the time, starting early with the rest of the contractors, who favored playing AC/DC through their iPod speakers and shouting things at each other while they worked. The architect in Arthur had never left. And he still loved to build with his hands, and not just his mind. 

Eames helped where he could but didn't want to cock anything up. He did a lot of lifting, hefting, and shifting of heavy things, and occasionally he brought water and sandwiches out to the crew.

"Do you like it?" Arthur asked him every few weeks.

"Yes," Eames said, understanding by mid-July that Arthur didn't give a shit about the barn, that he was doing this for Eames, because he wanted him to like it. "I think it's bloody fantastic."

And so was Arthur, with his dyed-dark hair and sinewy arms, muscles more defined than ever because of all the work he'd done.

' _Thank you_ ,' was so much more easily said without words.

** ** ** **

He and Arthur each got a call from Saito a few weeks after Eames's forty-sixth birthday. The West coast dream clinic was doing well, and it was difficult to have people who needed it traveling to Portland for its services. He was building one in New York, quite probably just north of the city, and would either of them be interested in working for it? 

Eames said that he couldn't, at least not permanently. Arthur said that he could, semi-permanently.

They met up at the house that March. It was all they discussed.

"It'd be pretty easy for me," Arthur said. "I already live close to it."

"Are you saying you're going to retire?" _What if I need you to work with me? What if I need Arthur the point man to watch my back?_

"How is taking another job on a semi-permanent basis even close to retirement, Eames?"

He knew that Arthur was getting annoyed with him, and maybe a bit hurt at the suggestion that he was retiring from dreamshare. But the idea of Arthur settling down into some kind of teaching or consulting position gnawed at him. 

It escalated to an actual argument, on both sides. By the end of their time upstate, Eames was blithely telling Arthur to do whatever the fuck menial work he wanted, after all it was his life, and Arthur was telling Eames to stop being such a spoiled shit and grow the fuck up.

This time when they took the rings off and put them in the back of the drawer upstairs, they stayed off for more than a year.

Arthur didn't contact him. Well, to be fair, he didn't contact Arthur, either. He thought about him often, and sometimes with a vague sense of panic. _Twenty-plus years, I've known him. People have been together that long and then gone their separate ways. It's easy._

** ** ** **

"Arthur's been..." Ariadne sighed over the phone and didn't continue.

"Has been what?" Eames asked, really fucked off because you just did not say shit like that to someone and then not finish. Arthur was in his mid-forties, he could have been anything, but _'unwell'_ was the word that came to Eames's mind.

"It's not mine to tell, Eames."

Well, clearly Arthur didn't want him to know, since he hadn't bothered to tell him what was going on. And what had those useless vows been for, anyway? Wasn't he supposed to be the one to sweep in and take care of things if Arthur should ever become ill? What was the point of it, if not that?

It was summer. He was in Mombasa again, and Arthur could have been anywhere. He waited a day, and then rang him. 

The conversation was stilted and awkward, made worse by the fact that he was terrified of what Arthur was going to tell him, if anything at all.

"I'm just having some tests done," he said. He sounded tired.

"What sort of tests?" Eames's hands felt cold. His insides were churning. 

"Blood tests."

"Yes, I had imagined that would be part of it, Arthur. Care to tell me what for?" 

"Just... nothing huge, I was feeling a little off and I decided to go get checked."

"And you also decided to keep this from me?"

"I didn't decide... Eames, are we even still together, or what?"

"For fucksake, Arthur." He wanted to throw the phone and watch it shatter. He wanted his insides to stop doing the ugly thing they were doing and he wanted to see Arthur, because somehow being there would make it more bearable. "Where are you?"

He was in New York again. Eames flew out that night. It was the longest flight of his life. He did not sleep on the plane. He went straight to Arthur's flat in the Bronx, his legs feeling heavier with every step, heart not so much thudding as fidgeting in his chest. Arthur buzzed him in with a quick, "Come on up."

When Arthur opened the door, he looked as tired as he had sounded on the phone. He had lost weight. His face was lined and shadowed and very, very pale. But his dark hair was still all present and accounted for.

"I can't believe you flew all the way here," Arthur said, with that infuriating smirk on his face as he stepped aside to let Eames in.

"Arthur, You had better start talking to me."

"Eames..."

"Don't give me any shit. Tell me what's going on and we'll hash the rest out later."

Arthur sighed, ever so weary, and sat on his sofa. He patted it, indicating that Eames should sit, too. He did so, or maybe his legs just finally gave out on him.

The doctors thought it was the result of some new compound he had been trying. The fatigue came first--nothing new to people in dreamshare—and Arthur had put it down to overwork, as he often did. But it kept getting worse. At his lowest, he couldn't make it up a flight of stairs. 

"I wasn't making enough red blood cells," Arthur said. "Or, aren't, I should say, since it's not totally resolved. They ran all the standard tests, for like cancer and other things like that. They didn't find anything. Cobb and Yusuf came up with the answer, actually. The new compound that's going around destroys all of your folic acid. A few prolonged uses and all of a sudden you're off your feet."

Eames wasn't sure he was hearing correctly. "So, how do they fix it?" _Do you spend the rest of your life not being able to climb the stairs? Do you have a chronic blood disease? Is this it?_ Arthur absolutely would sit there with that stone-cold, mild look on his face and tell him he was dying, were that the case.

"I stop using the compound," Arthur said, as if Eames were stupid. "And take supplements, vitamins, minerals and shit that I'll probably have to be on for a while, but, uh. It could have been worse." He shrugged.

Eames stood up and paced Arthur's flat. Everything inside of him still ached and he had nowhere to place any of of that hurt. Arthur hadn't even told him any of this. He rounded on him, so angry he could hardly contain it.

"You are a piece of work, you know that, Arthur?" 

Arthur stared at him with that same blasé look.

"You never bothered to call me because you were in too much of a strop – what if it had been as bad as they'd thought? Hmm? When you thought you might be dying, it never occurred to you to call me? To at least let me know?"

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Eames, I'm fine, jesus. Calm down. I wasn't going around telling everyone."

" _Everyone_. All of a sudden I'm just like everyone. Why the fuck did we walk into city hall that day, Arthur?"

"If anything had happened, someone would have notified you."

Eames stood staring at him, unable to believe the passive aggressive bullshit he was hearing. If this was Arthur's idea of revenge over a stupid row that could easily have been talked about...

"Yes, well," Eames said, as all of his fire dwindled, replaced by absolutely nothing, "see that someone does, all right? I need to know what to do with that house." 

He turned to leave. Arthur didn't stop him.

His phone buzzed while he was in the taxicab on his way back to the airport. He was shaking inside, afraid of how he was going to feel when he got himself alone. He picked up anyway.

"Eames," Arthur said, "do you want to get rid of the house? Just tell me what to do. I asked you years ago to just tell me straight out if this wasn't working for you anymore."

"I don't want..." He didn't know where to go with this, and certainly not while he was in a taxicab with someone listening in. "I don't know, Arthur. Apparently everyone else knew what was going on with you, but you never called me. I think this is more your decision than mine."

After a moment of silence, as Arthur so clearly thought this through and considered the situation, he said, "I'm sorry. Come back."

Eames did.

** ** ** ** 

It had become a kind of practical tradition to stop at Riley's on their way up to the house. The market never seemed to change, which was maybe a little odd, as everything around it did. But this time, as he drove up with Arthur on a mild day in September, it felt different. Eames couldn't place why that was, or how he knew. 

Darlene stood behind the counter. Her hair was greyer than ever and her face set with deep lines. She had lost weight. 

"Oh, why look who it is," she said. "Welcome home."

 _Home_.He had never really thought of any place in such a way. 

"Hey," Arthur said. "It's good to be back. How's everything?"

"Well, I suppose I should tell you." Her voice wavered on the verge of tears. "My Dad passed away over the summer. But other than that, everything's about the same."

Eames was hit with such unexpected sadness, he just stood there staring at her like a twat. 

"I'm so sorry to hear that," Arthur said. And he actually walked forward, leaned over the counter, and hugged her with one arm. "Your Dad was always so good to us."

"Oh, Arthur, he was good to everyone, wasn't he?"

"He sure was."

Eames shook himself free of his stupid shock. "I'm terribly sorry," he said. "I was very fond of Mr. Riley. You will let us know if you need anything, won't you?" He was aware that he took refuge in British politeness and distance when faced with sudden things like this, but he didn't know any other way. Not when he was being sincere with someone, when he wasn't conning them.

"I will, Mr. Eames," she said. "Thank you. But I think I'll be all right."

Would she? She was all alone now, as far as he knew. She had never married, and Eames had never heard mention of any brothers or sisters. Maybe he was wrong, though. How was he to know? He hoped he was wrong.

They finished their shopping and went home. Swept away the cobwebs, opened the windows, hoovered the floors, washed the sheets. They went into the barn—now a workspace that neither had used yet—and did the same. It took them until dusk. When they were done, they went back inside the house and Arthur set up his laptop and started tip-tap-typing, fingers quick as ever. Eames asked him what he wanted for tea and Arthur waved his hand over his shoulder dismissively. ' _Anything, don't bother me._ '

Eames made pasta and spinach, and watched the sun set outside the kitchen window.

Arthur came up behind him, wrapping his arms around his waist, resting his chin on his shoulder. "She's totally alone," he said. "I just checked. No brothers or sisters, no cousins or anything."

He rested his head against Arthur's. "Think she'll be all right?"

Arthur shrugged. "I guess. The market doesn't do that well, but it looks like she makes enough at city hall."

It wasn't exactly what Eames had meant, but how would Arthur know about anything else? And what could they do, either way?

After dinner, they had a bottle of wine and toasted to Mr. Riley.

They were tired from traveling, but not _too_ tired. And Eames never got bored of their grappling/dominance game. That night he allowed Arthur to win (and this time he actually did allow him; Arthur still got out of breath quicker than he used to, because of his past illness.) He let Arthur pin his hands (still strong, though,) and he wrapped his thighs around Arthur's slim hips, drawing him closer. God, how he had missed this.

When they finally made it upstairs for bed, Arthur came out of the bathroom in his draw-string flannel pajama bottoms, brushing his teeth. 

"Um, so," he said around a mouthful of toothpaste, "have you heard anything about the east coast clinic? It's done, you know. Construction, I mean."

Eames nodded. He had heard.

"I've seen it," Arthur went on. "It's pretty nice. So I guess what I want to know is, are you still going to act pissy if I do some work there?"

"No, Arthur." All of that seemed so far in the past, though it had only begun just under two years ago. He couldn't quite imagine why he'd taken the news of that so badly, anyway. "Do what makes you happy."

Arthur shrugged. "I don't know about that. I'm just going to give it a try. They'll probably still want you, too. At least once in a while."

But of course, getting involved in a public position at a well known clinic would put all of his future secret—and illegal--endeavors at risk. He doubted that Saito could protect against that.

Arthur went into the bathroom to finish up, then came back out and sat on the bed beside him. "How long until you can't outrun bullets anymore, Eames?"

He had no answer for that.

** ** ** **

Eames did a few low-key jobs that didn't involve a lot of shooting. His knees ached sometimes, and his shoulder seemed to get stuck in the mornings. His hair, when it turned, did so quickly, but he kept all of it. He worked with Yusuf in Mombasa, his old crew in Russia, and a few mates in England. 

Ariadne and Cobb broke up, then reunited. Then broke up again, and reunited again. Eames lost track.

He started to think of his time upstate as "home" and wasn't sure exactly when that happened.

This was the year that he grew a full beard and mustache. Arthur said it was stupid and he hated it, and kept telling him to shave it off, but he also kept rubbing it with his hands and his cheek. Eames laughed and called him a hypocrite. 

Arthur split his time between his Bronx flat, the New York clinic, and, well, home. Eames would still go weeks and sometimes months without seeing him. Arthur had somewhat less hair than he used to, but he stayed fit and trim, and seemed to do this effortlessly.

Eames started painting in the barn. The sun came in through the loft windows, and at night he turned on the overhead lights. On some nights, Arthur joined him out there to work on his laptop. Once or twice, Arthur came out with his guitar, and strummed away happily while Eames worked. "You're like this crazy, beardy painter," he said, and then made up a song about him.

In the summer of Eames's fifty-fourth year, he finally went to see the clinic where Arthur worked. It was all metal and glass, like the Portland one. Only bigger, sleeker and more "New York" as Arthur put it.

Seeing Saito came as a shock; Eames hadn't seen him in a few years. He was a sturdy, proud seventy-something, powerful and sly, offering Eames the chance to teach what he knew to the latest recruits. "Forging in the dream is still a rare gift, Mr. Eames," he said. "There is no one to guide them. No one as good as you, of course."

"I'm honored," Eames said. "I'll have to think about it, though. Still have a lot on my plate, as it were."

Arthur showed him around, with his arm linked through Eames's. _And here's where intakes are done, and here's the group center, and this is the auditorium, here's where I give lectures on PASIV technology, and this is my office..._

He pictured Arthur here, doing all the things he did. Giving a lecture like a uni professor, looking stately and knowledgeable to the next generation of dreamshare techs. Approachable yet still dangerous and knowing, commanding respect. Arthur in his corner office, doing what? Grading papers, or something?

"Is it fun?" Eames asked. _Are you happy?_

Arthur grinned. His dimples deepened into lines. "I really like it," he said, as if the childlike wonder of dreamshare had never left him. Or maybe he had rediscovered it through sharing it with others.

"Oh," he went on, "and wait till you see the new PASIV we're working on. It's so tiny. I'll bet you still use the model from two years ago. This one is so much better. Once you..."

A young woman, blond and bright, knocked on the door. Her smile was hesitant and shy; her eyes a bit shiny. Eames expected her to say something to Arthur like ' _Professor, I need to see you about my exam_ ', perhaps. But instead she looked at both of them, from one to the other, and then back. She reminded him a little of Phillipa, but Phil was older than this young lady, already out of college and engaged, last he had heard.

A tear spilled down the young lady's cheek and she pressed both hands to her mouth. "Oh, my god," she said. "You guys. Do you..."

Arthur got it first. Eames saw his jaw drop. It hit him a second later.

"Fiona?" he and Arthur said together.

She ran to both of them, her arms open, and she hit them like a truck. A very enthusiastic truck with arms stronger than they looked, as she clutched them both together.

They talked for a while in Arthur's office. She had just moved to New York with her Mom, in hopes that there might be a position for her at the clinic, as a counsellor. 

She asked if they still lived in the big, blue house. To his surprise, Eames heard himself telling her yes. Yes, he and Arthur did live together in their big, blue house. She asked if it would be all right if she came to visit them sometime.

"I'd like that," Arthur said.

The first time she came to visit, she baked them an apple pie.

** ** ** **

Eames sat at the computer station in the barn, where Arthur often wrote his notes for work. But this time Arthur was in the house on his own laptop and Eames was struggling to come up with something to write. Something to teach.

He stared at the screen for about two hours before giving up and heading back inside. He had to trudge the snow, and thought maybe it wasn't worth it to go all the way out there, when he could just as easily write something inside. Inspiration, which often came so fluidly to him in the barn, just wasn't coming.

Arthur had a cup of coffee on the table next to his laptop as he sat on the blue sofa, typing away. He was fifty-two, and though it showed in his receding hair and the lines around his eyes and mouth, he was still as sharp and lovely as Eames had always found him. He stopped typing once in a while to rub at his wrist, elbow and shoulder, as if it pained him. Old injuries were acting up, as they did in the winter. Later, Eames would ask Arthur if he'd like him to rub some Tiger Balm around his joints.

But for now, he sighed, toed off his shoes, and sat next to Arthur.

"Don't sweat it," Arthur said. "It's like any other job. You've always been good at talking to people."

That was true, but Eames was still sweating it. He knew how to talk to people, sure. But he'd never given a seminar before. He had never pulled out all the stops, and, in utter honesty, shared the tools of his trade, what made him a great forger. What made him the best. He didn't even know where to begin. 

"I don't know," he said, tucking his cold feet under him. "What do young people like these days, hmm?"

Arthur snorted as he shut down his word program. "The truth, same as they always have."

"I've always had difficulty with that."

"Just be yourself. They're gonna think you're awesome."

Eames put an arm around Arthur's shoulders and drew him closer, resting his head against Arthur's. "Is that even still a word?"

"Of course." Arthur turned his head and kissed lightly along his jaw. "You're hot, though. Try not to let that get in the way. Make them listen to you instead of just looking."

"Arthur, really," he scoffed. 

"Yes, really. They get crushes easily. It's hard not to when you work so closely, but with someone like you it's going to be a constant issue. And you might see a few things going on in their minds to prove it. Just go with it, okay? Don't let it make you feel like a pervert, because it's nothing you're doing." Arthur was still kissing him as he listed off these tips. "It's going to be doubly hard when they find out that we're together, too."

"'Doubly hard,'" Eames said, chuckling as he turned to face Arthur and kiss his mouth. 

"Don't worry about anything, okay?" Arthur said, slightly breathless. "I think you're going to really like it."

Eames would remember him saying that after his first seminar was over. Arthur wasn't quite right, this time. Eames didn't like it. 

He loved it. 

** ** ** **

Over the next two years, it worked out well enough that they actually kept to a semi-regular schedule. Eames did a few seminars on dream forgery, spread out over months, randomly. Forging in dreams garnered a huge interest, but it took time to find enough people who could actually do it. And their purposes weren't as nefarious as Eames's had been. He taught them to forge in order to break down mental blocks, to de-program, to heal and strengthen their own minds and the minds of others. It wasn't exciting in the way that high-danger jobs used to be, but there was something to it – something to being listened to as an authority. As _the_ authority. And there was definitely something to witnessing the excitement of another person's mind as they did it for the first time.

Arthur went into the city to stay in his own flat for three days out of every week, where he commuted to the clinic. His areas of focus were militarization and PASIV technology. This he did for eight months out of the year: leaving on Monday nights and returning on Thursday nights. Taking time away from this work was not a problem, and Arthur still took jobs outside of the clinic, too. 

It was good, because they had enough time with each other, and still just enough time apart so as not to drive the other round the bend. And those month-long jobs on the other side of the world occasionally still came up. They separated easily when that happened, as they always had.

And so it went, at least for a while.

The time from when Cobb called Arthur to tell him he wasn't well and was taking some time off work, until he was truly sick, seemed to pass in a blink.

Eames came home from one of his seminars to find Arthur packing a larger-than-normal suitcase. He knew that Arthur had work lined up for the week, but years of living semi-on-the-run with Arthur had quelled any natural panic instinct he might have had. 

"Job?" he asked, even though he knew, by the firm set of Arthur's mouth and the lines on his forehead, that it wasn't.

Arthur shook his head as if he didn't trust himself to speak.

"What, then?" Eames asked, schooling his voice to keep level.

"Gotta go to Portland," Arthur said, not looking up. "Cobb's pretty sick."

Eames knew that Cobb was ill; it had been in the newspapers--the controversial dreamshare pioneer, after all—but Arthur saying _'pretty sick'_ made it sound more like what it actually was.

"I'll go with you, shall I?" Eames said. "If he wouldn't mind."

Arthur looked up from his suitcase, and, out of habit, slicked back a lock of hair that he no longer had. "Yeah, okay."

They had about ten days with Cobb. 

Phillipa was at Cobb's house with her fiance, a genial British special agent. Eames was not surprised. She still smiled coyly at him and kissed both his cheeks, the way Mal used to. Her fiance's name was Harry – not after the prince, she specified, but after Harry Potter. He read her life so easily: she was, in general, happy. But she also knew that her life was about to change drastically. 

When Arthur hugged her and asked where James was, she turned away, her mouth pursed in a frown, also exactly like Mal would have done. How had she picked that up from a mother she'd barely known? She informed them that James was on a skiing trip and couldn't cut his vacation short. That was how it was between them. It happened even in the best of families, and the Cobbs were never entirely well adjusted.

Ariadne cancelled all of her jobs and came home, too. She and Cobb had been on and off over the many years, but that's what she called Cobb's place: "home." 

She was in her forties, and still somehow childlike. Her skin was smooth and lovely, her eyes big, and taking everything in. Her hair was short now, a little pixie cut that suited her. She burst into tears when she saw them.

She was still so young. So young to be losing someone she loved.

The house smelled of antiseptic and oatmeal. Phil went to check on her father, to see if he was awake for visitors. Over the awkward small talk her fiance made with Arthur, Eames heard Cobb's enthusiastic voice: "Yeah, of course, send them in!"

"It's nice to meet you," Arthur said to Harry, shaking his hand.

"I'm sorry it's under such poor circumstances," Harry said. "Can't be helped, though, eh?" When he shook Eames's hand, he looked closely at him, as if he could see something of a resemblance between them. Then he glanced at Phil, smiling.

She led them to Cobb's room. Where his bed had presumably been—the one he'd shared with Ariadne over the years—now stood an adjustable hospice bed. Papers lay scattered over the sheets, old manila folders, an open laptop. He was working to the last.

There was something lovely about Cobb. There always had been. Eames had thought so even when Cobb was a mess of contradictions, telling Eames "you'd never sell me out" and then turning around and betraying his team. He was too young to be looking as old and worn thin as he did, and the sickness had bled away his color and gnawed at his bones. But his smile was still that of a million-dollar poster boy when he saw them. Well, Arthur in particular.

"Thanks for coming," he said, shifting to sit up higher. 

"Of course," Arthur said. He pulled up a chair on one side of the bed. Eames pulled up another.

On closer inspection, Cobb's eyes were overbright, pupils dilated. The morphine was doing its job.

They talked about Phil and James ("I understand," Cobb said, "he just can't make it home sometimes, you know?") and Phil's fiance Harry ("I like him, even though he's Eames 2.0," Cobb said, laughing; and then, without laughter, "I won't be there for the wedding, though.") They talked about work, and dreaming, new compounds versus the old ("I overused the old stuff and it finally caught up with me. Mal used it even more than I did. She would have gotten sick years ago.") Cobb spoke happily of his clinic, and about how pleased he was with the East coast one, too, ("I'm glad Saito got you guys on board. There aren't many of us pioneers around to steer the ship, you know?") 

They managed to laugh together, shakily at first, and then with more surety. It was good, actually; Eames hadn't expected it to be anything but trying, but it was good. 

After about an hour, Cobb grew fatigued. They both sensed it and glanced at each other, trying to agree on their exit.

"Hang on," Cobb said, not fooled by their attempt at subtlety. "I'd like a few minutes with Arthur, if that's all right. Just to discuss a few things. Some legal stuff about when I'm gone. That all right with you, Arthur?"

"More than," Arthur said.

Eames let himself out, and explained to Phil that her father needed to talk to Arthur. Her tears came then, and she hurried to grab some tissues from her pocket. 

"I'm sorry," she said, trying to laugh at herself, "don't mind me. It happens sometimes."

"Of course it does," Eames said.

He left her and Harry together, and found Ariadne in the kitchen. Her back was to him as she boiled water for tea. 

There was no sense in babbling inanities to her. "Will you be all right?" he asked.

She shrugged. "Yeah, of course. There's no choice, you know? Dom's going to die, and I'm going to keep living, and I have to be all right. That's how it goes. It's how it went for him when Mal jumped, too."

He thought about Cobb, wasted away on the hospice bed. _We all come to that. Whether by one's own body turning traitor, and surrounded by family watching us wither, or whether by taking a quick bullet to the brain. Or a car accident. Or a fall down the stairs or a sudden, lightning-strike stroke. But each of us will see that day, and everyone else will go on._

Of course, that was something Eames had considered since his teens, when bullets to brains seemed the more likely scenario. He'd never been unaware of it, and he'd come pretty close himself. He'd seen people die; it was nothing new. What _was_ new was looking at it from beyond the expected halfway mark.

"We'll stay on to help, you know," Eames told her. "Should you need anything."

She turned to him, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. "Yeah, I know. You guys have always been good about that."

"Well. Arthur has."

Ariadne smiled. "And where Arthur goes, you've always gone. I know you guys aren't together every single day, but when it matters, you are. You can pretend that you have no loyalty, but I've never seen you ditch your team."

"Arthur's my team?" he asked, amused.

"Sure he is." She looked down, trying to hide that sudden pain that comes out of nowhere, then turned her back again. "I left Dom a few times," she said.

"Now, none of that. Don't do that to yourself; it's useless."

"It's not that I regret it, necessarily. If I'd stayed here all the time, I would have resented him." She sighed, and pulled herself together. "You and Arthur ever split up? I mean like, actually, really split up?"

"Once or twice," Eames admitted. "Once for more than a year, yes. And he was very ill at the time; you remember that part, I'm sure. He hurt me, I hurt him back. Or maybe it went the other way around. Doesn't matter."

"Dom's had a hard life," she said, gazing out the back window. The playset that Phil and James had climbed on and swung from was long gone. 

"He's had an eventful life," Eames said. "That's the only way to live, you know."

It happened fast, after that. He and Arthur stayed at the same hotel they'd stayed at after they'd brought Fiona and Lauren to the clinic, so many years ago. Ariadne called them at 5:45 on that final morning, told them that it would be today, and they should come quickly.

Arthur didn't say a word as he got dressed, nor on the ride to the house.

There were no nervous, friendly greetings this time. Just quick instructions whispered hurriedly, _Please wait here, I have to make sure, okay, go on inside..._

Cobb was conscious. He gripped Arthur's hand and pulled him down to whisper something urgent into his ear.

"Yeah Cobb, I got it. Yes, I remember," Arthur whispered back. "Don't worry, okay?"

He murmured a few more words that sounded like nonsense to Eames. Before they left the room, Arthur bent down and kissed his forehead with such tenderness that Eames had to turn away. He heard him whisper something like, "It's all right, I'll take care of it."

_Typical Arthur._

Cobb was gone by noon. Phillipa and Ariadne were with him, while Eames, Arthur and Harry sat in silence in the great room. Just as soon as the door opened, everyone knew that it was over. Ariadne didn't have to say anything. Arthur rose and hugged her while she cried, and cried, and cried. Phillipa stayed in the room with her father until the hospice service came to take him away.

The funeral was extravagant on almost a celebrity scale, as it was both provided and attended by Saito. Newspapers heralded the passing of "controversial dream-therapy pioneer Dominic Cobb" and made mention of the accusations leveled against him, of course. And yet, as helicopters wheeled overhead and everyone—including James—stood up to say a few words on that windy, sunny day, Cobb was finally interred next to Mal.

Eames wondered if perhaps they were both topside, waiting on everyone else. If that meant anything at all, in the end.

He and Arthur kept to their word to stay on and help. Eames had never had all too much to do with Cobb's life personally, not the way Arthur had. He stayed with Ariadne mostly, cooking and helping her go through the house, collecting her worldly goods. It was no longer her home.

Arthur spent most of his time with Phillipa (and, briefly, James, who stayed an extra week before jetting off again,) sat at the dining room table going over documents. Arthur took care of the will, the house, and Cobb's entire estate. He spoke to all the lawyers and told Phillipa what to do, what to sign, and what would happen next. He spoke to the press and covered the entire family with "no comment" and "requesting privacy during this difficult time." 

One night, after they had left for the day, Arthur didn't drive back to the hotel. Instead he told Eames they had to take a trip to California, without any watchful eyes. There were some things he still had to take care of.

The next morning they pulled up to a storage facility. Arthur took a key and a piece of paper out of his pocket, following the numbers until he found Cobb's one.

"They're going to auction it soon," Arthur said, "and some things are never supposed to get out. Old jobs and stuff. Names, aliases, accounts."

Inside was a single safe and nothing more. Arthur opened it, removed an armful of papers in old, musty folders, and some turn-of-the-century data files, and shoved them into his satchel. Then he closed and locked everything down.

It wasn't until they were back at their hotel, two weeks after Cobb's death, and finally getting ready to go home that Arthur broke down. Eames sat with him on the bed, an arm around his shoulders as he wept, and thought, _Arthur would have done the same thing for me even without a ring._


	6. Chapter 6

The times in between the bad times were long and good. Sometimes more than good – sometimes they were ecstatically lovely. 

Arthur bought a piano to put in the barn (they still called it a barn, even though it hadn't been one for years.) He played fairly well in that he could pick out melodies, if not entire chords, easily enough. Eames spent the summer of his sixty-third out there on all of his days home, painting his brains out. He created landscapes, portraits, and dreams. He painted Fiona's dog, a black lab named Savannah, which she brought over with her every time she came to visit. Arthur wrote out his courses indoors, and when he had free time, he came out to watch Eames paint, and plunk around on the piano. 

Arthur tried and tried for Rachmaninoff's Prelude in G Minor from Opus 23. Quite often he managed the melody, note by note. Sometimes it was distracting to Eames and he wished Arthur would stop, go the fuck away, and leave him in peace. Other times so ridiculously endearing that he would stop painting to snog Arthur all the way back to the house. (Sex on the barn floor, or any floor, was too uncomfortable.) 

Darlene Riley died the following winter. The turnout for her funeral seemed to include the entire surrounding city. Eames wore black and Arthur wore dark grey. The Riley market closed down. 

In the spring, when they had time together, the still went to the lake in town to have lunch and watch the boats.

Yusuf's death was so out of the blue that Eames didn't know what to make of it for the first day after Arthur told him. (Arthur still kept tabs on everyone in dreamshare.) When he got over his shock, he got his shit together, called off his seminar, and went to Mombasa. Arthur finished the job he was working on and joined him two days later.

It took some doing to find out where Yusuf had been living. His home, when they finally located it, was tastefully luxurious, filled with more papers than chemicals these days, as Yusuf's grieving wife showed them around.

"He was working so hard," she told them, drying her tears. "Writing papers, always writing. But he kept some of them secret, old documents to be destroyed. I don't know where they are, but if they come to light, I could lose everything. I don't know what to do."

Eames did. He did for Yusuf's wife what Arthur had done for Cobb's family. He found what needed to be destroyed, and he destroyed it. (Mostly documentation on what Yusuf used for his illegal work years ago, implicating all of his suppliers as well.) His wife handed over everything that Yusuf was working on - research that he had intended to publish in journals. Eames got them published. 

They stayed in Mombasa for two weeks. There he learned that it wasn't his home anymore, and that was fine.

** ** ** **

They almost made to the end of Arthur's sixty-fourth year without incident. That vague worry still nagged at the back of Eames's skull nearly every day: _Sixty-four, sixty-four, sixty-four._ He wasn't entirely sure why. He'd dreamed about it sometime, long ago. (Or maybe last week. He wasn't as good at dream-recall as he'd been in his younger days.)

Arthur was two weeks away from sixty-five. It was morning, and Eames was making crepes. Arthur had his go-bag by the front door and was getting ready for his three-day work week in the city. He still kept that flat in the Bronx. 

"I've got a seminar next weekend," Eames said. "I'll be leaving the day after you come back."

"Okay," Arthur said. He looked over Eames's shoulder to check the crepes, then reached over him to get a glass from the cupboard. "But you'll be here Thursday night when I get back?"

"Yeah," Eames answered, flipping a crepe and thinking about Thursday night. He'd pack everything tonight, then, and get his notes together so that he wouldn't be in a rush to do it the day before leaving. 

"How about I just stop on my way home," Arthur said, "and get some take-out so you don't have to cook? I'll get us a bottle of wine, too."

Eames heard the scrape of metal on metal, the delicate clinking of broken glass. He smelled asphalt and blood. _Sixty-four, sixty-four, sixty-four_. 

The pain that speared through his chest staggered him. He thought he was going to throw up, or faint, or both. He couldn't breathe.

"Eames." Arthur's voice seemed to come from under water. Arthur's hands on his shoulders were distant and cold. Everything inside him felt constricted, as with a metal band. Arthur turned him around and he felt himself sag against the countertop.

"Get in the car." Arthur said, slinging an arm around his waist, his face frantic and pale. 

Eames's legs felt heavy and they didn't want to work. Arthur was still quite strong, and took most of his weight. 

"You're all right," Arthur told him as he helped him into the car. "You're okay, I've got you."

Throughout the drive to the hospital, during which Arthur weaved through traffic and flew through red lights with his horn blaring, his voice remained calm and even. "You're all right, just breathe. We'll get you there. You're gonna be fine. It's easy, okay? The whole thing is easy. We'll be home in a few days. Take some time off and relax. That's what we'll do."

Eames nodded his head when he could. The pain eased up after a few minutes, then came back, then ebbed once more.

He was able to walk on his own by the time they got to the ER. There the woman at the counter slid some papers across to them and mentioned "triage." Arthur slid the papers back to her, still blank, and said, "Are you sure there's enough time for that?" in a quiet enough voice that she blanched, swallowed hard, and hurried to the back. 

They took him into a room and left Arthur behind. 

Eames felt very much part of a process, like a piece of meat on a conveyor belt. He was "helped" out of his clothes and into a gown. He was placed onto a table where pills were put under his tongue and EKGs stuck on him, and then he was scrubbed and prepped and told it was "fairly non-invasive." The entire thing felt extremely invasive to him.

Then he was sedated and prodded some more, gadgets stuffed into his blood vessels , and finally he was told that it was over, and he could rest for a while. Eames didn't think that was going to be possible by any stretch of the imagination. But, by and by, as they left him alone in increments, he drifted off painlessly.

_And Arthur lives. This time, Arthur lives._

_He holds onto his hand, wrinkled and cold (_ old? _) and breaks the water, gasping into Arthur's mouth. Arthur laughs, with water sparkling in his dark hair (_ hair? No, not for years now, _) and then looks at Eames, bemused._

When he opened his eyes, Arthur was sat on a chair next to the bed, reading something on his tablet. He looked tired, but not worried. Eames sighed to get his attention, and shifted around in the hospital bed, trying to stretch. It pulled his incisions and he stopped. 

Arthur looked up and shut off the tablet. "Hey."

"Hey back. Aren't you supposed to be at my bedside, cooing endearments at me and stroking my fevered brow?"

"You don't have a fever," Arthur said. "But I am at your bedside. Sort of." He came over to sit on the edge of the bed. It was actually less comfortable because Eames was forced to scoot aside and he was still a bit painful, but Arthur leaned over and kissed him on the mouth. Then he said, "Eames, what the fuck."

"Sorry I frightened you."

"All you had to do was ask me to stay home," Arthur said, smiling.

"Cheeky twat."

"You'll be fine, you know. They said that. We take a week off, and then you can slowly start going back to your normal routine, and add in some exercise. But for the first week, no strenuous activity. And no sexual activity. They were clear on that."

"Bastards." 

"But after the first week, exercise is good for you. Including strenuous sexual activity. So that's one good thing." Arthur kissed him again.

They went home the next day, with prescriptions and future doctor appointments for stress tests, and papers outlining what Eames should and should not do.

They took more than the week off. They took the month, and went to Paris for a week, just to walk around. And since they were clear for strenuous sexual activity (which is what Arthur now called it on every occasion: "How about lunch, and then strenuous sexual activity?" "Eames, get your clothes off for some strenuous sexual activity." "Maybe later I'll strenuous sexual activity you on the balcony, so everyone can see.") they spent a lot of time in their hotel room, too.

They came home tired but happy.

Eames started running again. Arthur ran with him, but his knees ached at night. They ate less crepes and more fruit, less pasta and more spinach. It was still good. The weight that had accumulated around his middle slowly started to melt away again. (Arthur had never gained a pound, the skinny bastard. "At least you got to keep your hair," Arthur reminded him.)

Fiona's mother Lauren moved back to the west coast. Shortly after that, Fiona came for a visit, this time with a sugar-free, low fat apple pie. She kissed them both hello, said she was glad that Eames was fine, and then burst into tears. 

She was pregnant, and going it alone. But she was in her thirties and had a good job – they assured her that she would be fine. 

They both went back to work. Eames's seminar students still followed him around adoringly, clutching their tablets and laptops, talking hurriedly and excitedly to him about their breakthroughs. He thought of them as ducklings, sometimes.

"Ducklings who want to have strenuous sexual activity with you," Arthur told him as his sipped his morning coffee.

"You're preposterous," Eames said, even though he knew that it was true, at least in some cases. He knew the hot feeling of eyes roaming all over him, even at his age. 

Their schedules didn't change much. Arthur was still away for three days out of every week. Eames painted, and wrote, and ran, and taught. 

Saito, pushing ninety, funded two more clinics: one in Japan and one in Paris. He called on Eames and Arthur both, to bring their skill sets to each clinic a few times a year, where they were working on eliminating language barriers through dreams. Often they had to go at different times, and that was fine.

They always returned to the blue house, the safe house. To Autumn Road.

** ** ** **

The seasons came and went in a blur. 

Ariadne came to visit once or twice. She was still lovely in her sixties, in the way that certain people managed; straight-backed and sharp, well-spoken and, for the most part, happy. She had never married and she preferred it that way. She spoke of Cobb often and fondly, and she was still close with Phillipa and Harry. She rarely heard from James.

Fiona had a baby girl, Mallorie, who quickly grew into toddlerhood. Eames saw them both around town once in a while, saw Fiona at the clinic less, and he and Arthur had the occasional visit from them on a Sunday.

Eames kept to his regiment, because it kept him feeling happy. Arthur ran less because of his knees, but they did go hiking once in a while. Arthur always said that maybe they would see Rose, although they both knew that surely she was long gone by now. 

"I'd like to see another bear," Arthur said one evening after a hike, because he was ridiculous and mad. Eames was happy if he never ran into one again. Although when he looked back on that day, (weeks ago, it seemed, sometimes moments,) it was always with laughter. 

"I'll show you one, then," he said. 

"I'll bet," Arthur said, as they went inside.

It was April, still early enough in Spring to get chilly at night. While Arthur was putting away the dishes from their earlier tea, Eames dragged a bench and an end table outside to the porch. He set up the little fire-pit he'd gotten a few years ago, threw a blanket on the bench, and called Arthur outside.

"What." Arthur stated his question as an imperative, as he often did. He was drinking a glass of wine and had his tablet in his hand.

Eames patted the bench beside him. Arthur smiled and took a seat, placing his glass on the table. 

"What are we doing?" he asked.

Eames put one arm around Arthur's shoulders, and pointed to the night sky, toward Ursa Major. "There's your bear, my love," he said.

Arthur snorted. "Okay." But he put his arm around Eames's waist, tucked his knees up, and turned toward him. He pressed his cold nose against Eames's neck.

The little fire crackled and sparked. 

"All right?" Eames asked.

"Yeah." Arthur yawned against him. "Tired. You want anything from inside?" Arthur asked. "Wine or something?"

"Nope. I'm fine." 

And he was. He was so fine. 

"You're my dream," he said. "My Arthur." He tightened his arm a bit so that he would stay put. They would both regret this in the morning, and even in a few hours when they had to get up, with joints creaking and aching in protest. But for now, it was good just to be still and rest. Eames closed his eyes. 

"Say it again," Arthur said against his neck.

"My Arthur. My love." It came easily these days.

"Thank you," Arthur said.

Once, perhaps an hour later or so (it was hard to tell,) Arthur coughed a bit. His hand flitted over Eames's thigh. Eames stirred enough to take his hand and pull the blanket around both of them. Then he settled back down. 

Tree frogs hummed and buzzed. The fire ebbed down to embers.

It was the absolute silence that woke him hours later. He cracked his eyes open to the barest fingers of dawn. No tree frogs, no birds, no breeze. Just a hint of light, a hint of fog, the scent of pines, and utter stillness.

"Arthur," he whispered.

Arthur didn't answer. He was still pressed up against Eames's side. His hand, still on Eames's thigh, was motionless.

Eames's life split irrevocably into two separate parts, bisected between the first time he called Arthur's name and expected an answer, and the second time, when he already knew. A matter of seconds.

"Arthur," he said again, taking hold of his hand, which was cold and mottled. 

The cold seemed to seep from Arthur's hand into his own. It ran through his veins and took up residence. 

It never left.


	7. Chapter 7

** ** ** **

Eames lost count of how many people he lied to. "I'm all right. I'll be fine. I've got enough, yes. I appreciate your kindness."

He thanked a lot of people he didn't want to thank. He accepted words and gifts and stupid flowers. He accepted company because it was easier than saying "Leave me alone, I don't want this and I don't want you." People told him that Arthur was in a better place, and he refrained from telling their well-meaning faces to fuck off, because there was no better place for Arthur than here, with him. It was the stupidest bullshit he had ever heard, and he thanked them for it.

Ariadne came to town, as did Saito, Phillipa, Harry, and their son Dominic. They hung about the house, seeming to take it in shifts, so that Eames wouldn't be alone. Once, he woke up on the sofa after having dozed off while Ariadne was there. (He slept at unexpected times. Grief was exhausting.) She was gone, and Saito was in his kitchen. 

The man was ninety and he still walked like a king. Age had shrunken him, but not by much. Eames had an instant where he hated him, resented and loathed him for living so long. Arthur hadn't even made it to seventy. How was that fair?

Saito brought him a cup of tea from the kitchen and sat on the sofa next to him.

"Tell me," Saito said, "about how Arthur died."

Eames thought about being angry and telling him to get the fuck out. To hell with all his clinics, and fucking dreams and research and his insane amounts of money that couldn't buy Arthur another few years. 

"Quietly," Eames said, surprising himself. "He had a glass of wine, looked at the stars, and went to sleep." He dropped his head into his hands and wept. Actually, Arthur hadn't finished his glass of wine. 

"It's rare that a warrior such as Arthur gets an easy death. Mr. Eames. I am not telling you to be grateful. There is no happiness in your loss. People will tell you, 'At least he didn't suffer.' When my wife died, people told me, 'At least she isn't suffering anymore,' and, "At least you had a moment to say goodbye.' However, in death, I have learned, there is no 'at least.' We all come to the same end. But one thing you must always remember is that Arthur lived more than most people. Not longer. Just more than."

"I know," Eames said. It still didn't make any difference.

"You will, of course, let me know if you need anything." Saito had never quite learned the inflection of requests as opposed to orders.

"Yes. Of course."

After those first few dark, hectic days, people trickled out of his life. Ariadne was the last to go, leaving him with food, and all of her phone numbers. "You had something that most people never know," she said. "I know I didn't. And that's kind of okay, because it's so much harder when you lose it." She kissed him, and left.

All at once, the house was quiet, as it had never been before. Eames literally didn't know what to do with himself. Every chair was uncomfortable. The sofa was empty without Arthur on it. He had slept alone in bed much of the time he had lived here, the two of them being away for so long, but this emptiness was never to be filled again. So he dozed off in tiny increments throughout the day, sometimes sitting at the kitchen table. Without anyone around, he didn't eat until he remembered that he had to.

He'd wanted to be left alone, but now that he was, he began to understand why people crowded around a person who's just lost someone. It was to give them a reason to breathe. 

Ariadne and Saito had made the arrangements and had taken care of all the critical, after-death nonsense. He expected Arthur's ashes back soon, though he would have to go and pick them up. Eventually he would have to leave the house anyway. Buy food. Go to the clinic to get Arthur's things. All of that seemed so far off.

In the haze of his own grief, he had forgotten his part of the deal. It occurred to him during one of those insurmountable nights alone in bed, when he didn't want to be awake, but couldn't sleep. Arthur's estate. Arthur's legal documents. His secrets, and all the things he had made such a fuss over being seen to after his death. 

That was something that Eames could do, at least. It was going to hurt, but time was of the essence. And waiting wasn't going to make it easier.

The first place to look was, naturally, Arthur's laptop. It was where Arthur had left it: in his go-bag, next to his side of the bed. Eames turned on the light and reached across over Arthur's side. It took him a few minutes, because for a while he just lay there, paralyzed by the scent of Arthur on the pillow.

He pulled the laptop out of the bag, plugged it in (it needed to charge,) and set his glasses on. It prompted him for a password when it finally started.

He typed: _asoulawake_ and the screen came to life. Arthur's wallpaper was the same Escher one that he'd always used. 

Before he could start searching for Arthur's files, a media player popped up and began to autoplay.

It was Arthur's face, still young, probably around forty. He looked tired, weak and haggard. From when he had been ill that time, no doubt. When they had been apart. 

Arthur-on-screen cleared his throat, adjusted the camera, and addressed him.

"Eames. Hey. Umm. So you opened this computer using my old password. I wasn't keeping my new password from you, since they both work. I set it up like this because I knew you'd need it one day. The old password means that something probably happened to me. So, with that in mind, uhh, you know how this goes, pretty much." He looked down, then back up, directly into the camera. 

Eames felt the Arthur from all those years ago looking at him from the past. He traced his finger across the screen, following the line of his mouth.

"If you're seeing this, then I might be dead. As of right now, as of today when I'm recording this, that, uhh... that looks like it might not be too far off. I'll probably call you before it gets to that point. But this video is for after the fact. So first thing's first, you can't watch this before I'm actually dead. If I'm just incapacitated, click away, and that will take you to a different folder of things you need to do. So here's where I'm asking you to confirm that I am, actually, deceased. Go ahead and choose."

The video went dark for a moment. Eames resisted the urge to call Arthur back with a word or a gesture. In its place, a menu popped up, showing two clickable buttons. One said "Incapacitated" and the other said "Deceased."

With tears streaming unchecked down his face, Eames clicked "Deceased."

Arthur came back on the screen.

"Okay, that means I'm dead. Now that we've got that out of the way, here's a few things I want you to know.

"The first thing is the most important. This is the part where I tell you all of the things that need to be done when I'm gone. All that stuff we used to discuss, about why we got married and everything. So here's what I need you to do for me now that I'm gone."

He stopped, looked down, then looked directly at Eames again.

"Nothing. I don't need you to do anything. Everything's taken care of on this computer, with the button you just clicked. All evidence I ever wanted destroyed is gone, and I'm deleted out of all databases everywhere. My aliases are deleted and all those accounts transferred. You don't have to do anything. Don't worry about it."

Arthur looked away again, smirking, sly and a bit arrogant. Eames missed him so much it was a physical pain. When Arthur looked into the camera again, it was with utter candor.

"That whole thing about having to be married to look after the legal stuff... I realized it this year. Eames, that was kind of bullshit. I just wanted you for myself. I didn't mean to be deceitful, because even I didn't really figure it out at the time. But now I know. And if I'm not sitting here dying as I record this—I mean, if I beat whatever this thing is that's making me sick and I get another couple of years or whatever—then I hope I'm not too stupid to let you know that. That I love you. Even now, when I'm pissed at you and I haven't seen you in about a year. Still.

"So anyway, that's the story, Eames. Everything is taken care of. And I'm sorry that I'm gone, because I know you're mourning. I guess I can't really help you with that. I hope you still find some joy in life, something to live for. You have work, and all of that. You never lived for me before, Eames, so don't start now. I just hope that you're still happy. That really is what I want.

"Okay, that's it, I guess. So just, you know. Wipe your eyes, take a deep breath, and go outside or something. Right. Okay."

He seemed to not know how to end it gracefully. He just reached forward, until all that was visible was the slope of his cheekbone and the shadow of his eyelashes, and shut off the camera.

The screen went dark again. It blurred in Eames's vision. The tears wouldn't stop coming, even though it didn't feel like he was actively weeping. He wondered when they would exhaust themselves.

Before he could ponder this for too long, another video popped up. Arthur looked slightly better in this one, happier, and more awake. It had to have been after he'd been cleared of the anemia. 

"Eames, I thought of something else. There should be a jump drive in the inner side pocket of this laptop case. Go ahead and get it."

Eames scrambled for the case at the side of the bed and pulled it next to him. His shaking hands sought this mysterious side pocket. He couldn't find it.

"It's on the left," Arthur-on-screen said.

Eames fought the urge to thank him. He found a slim compartment with a sleek, black jump drive secreted inside it. 

"So this might be a really stupid idea I'm having, Eames," Arthur-on-screen went on. "I hope not. All right, just fire that drive up. And remember, you can shut it off at any time. If it brings you more torment than comfort, seriously, just shut it off. It's nothing important."

The video stopped there. Eames plugged in the jump drive. It was full of videos. Nothing but videos, hundreds of them, arranged by number. He started to get a vague idea of what Arthur had done. The loss of him was crushing, like a great, physical weight. Still, he had to see him again; had to see more. He clicked on the first video. It was Arthur, of course – nothing but Arthur, always Arthur, everywhere. 

"Hi," Arthur said. He was in his Bronx flat, and he looked still better than he had in the last video. "It's amazing that we have the technology to go into other people's dreams, but we can't upload our consciousness into a computer. What's with that? 

"So here's the thing. I don't want you using the PASIV to go under and talk to projections of me. It's fine if you just dream of me naturally, obviously, but please don't use the PASIV like Dom did. I don't want to be reduced to that, because it won't be me. Please don't make me a shade. This is me, okay? I'm recording these for you. I'll do this a few times a year, I guess. If you want to hear me, use these instead. 

"It's not like I'm sitting here thinking about being dead or anything. But the truth is, I kind of know it's going to be me first. So I'll continue making these videos for you until I'm gone. I'll just, I don't know. Talk to you. Tell you stories. Show you things. Whatever. Anytime you want to see me, plug in the jump drive. But if I'm making you feel worse, then don't do it. There's nothing important on here, nothing you need to know."

Arthur spoke on, for about three more minutes. He talked about his flat, said he'd had a leaky pipe that needed fixing. That he was going to go back upstate to do some work on the house. Then he said, "Okay, so. Goodnight, Eames. Try to get some sleep." 

The video stopped as Arthur leaned forward to shut the camera off. 

There were hundreds of these videos. 

Eames left the jump drive in, but closed the laptop. He felt wrung out, dehydrated, and, at least for the moment, completely out of tears. He couldn't keep his eyes open. He fell into a light sleep with the laptop still beside him, and Arthur's voice echoing in his mind all night. _Eames. Eames! Eames?_ Over and over, in every inflection.

** ** ** **

He listened to Arthur's stories. Weeks went by, and then months, and every night Eames plugged in the jump drive and let Arthur-of-the-past speak to him. 

_"Hi, Eames. I'm up here at the house and you're away. I went hiking. I didn't see Rose though."_

_"Hey Eames. I'm in Paris right now, and..."_

_"Hey. I'm watching you sleep right now, which is kind of creepy. I'm going to wake you up with a blow job."_

_"So today I..."_

_"Last night at the clinic..."_

_"I'm in Florence. The city, not a woman."_

_"I'm in Sao Paolo on a job, probably see you when I get back..."_

He watched Arthur grow old again. Sometimes he needed these videos, and couldn't wait to hear what Arthur was going to say on the next one. Other times, he hated it, and hated Arthur for leaving him with a bunch of stupid, useless digital recordings and nothing to touch. Sometimes the anger overwhelmed the sorrow, and almost felt better than it.

"What the fuck were you thinking?" Eames asked the laptop one night, before calling up the next video of Arthur. "Why would you do this to me? How could you think this would be a comfort? God damn you, Arthur, how could you do this?"

He played the next video anyway.

"I told you," Arthur said, "if this ever hurts you, stop watching. There's nothing important here."

Eames's reply caught in his throat. He had been about to answer, to argue with Arthur (who was in his fifties by the time he'd recorded this segment.) It was ridiculous, and stupid, to think what he was thinking. It was impossible and beautiful, and he felt like an idiot all the same.

"It's all right," he said to Arthur on the screen, because there was no one around to see him talking to a computer. "I'm not angry. Go on."

Arthur chose that moment to speak. "Okay. If you're all right with this. Uhh, let's see. I heard from Cobb today. He sounds tired. He says he doesn't feel well. Umm. If he gets worse I'll probably go see him."

Eames knew then what the next video from Arthur was going to be. He dreaded it, but couldn't wait until the next night to watch it, either. He clicked on it, brought Arthur back to life yet again. This Arthur was haggard, tired, his eyes red-rimmed. He was at home, at Autumn Road. For the first time, Eames wondered what he had been doing when Arthur had recorded some of these, because he knew that he'd been in the house at this time, too.

"Eames, hey. You're in the shower right now."

It gutted him how Arthur answered his questions sometimes.

"Cobb is, uhh... Cobb's gone and we just got home from taking care of all his business. I know I thanked you for helping me with that. But thank you again. It's pretty rough right now and you're the only thing making me feel human again. I want to tell you a story right now. I can say this now that Cobb's gone.

"Right after Mal died, there were a few weeks when I didn't know where Cobb was. He'd left the country and he hadn't told me. Umm. I know that you forged a passport to get him out of the country. You pretty much saved his ass back then. He hadn't come to me, though, for anything. I remember thinking, Why not? Why wouldn't Cobb ask me for help? I didn't want to think about what that might mean. Like he had something to hide, you know?

"Then he called me for a job in South America. I went because I didn't know what else to do and I wanted to help, or something. The job was a huge clusterfuck. Cobb made every mistake there was to make. His projection of Mal did a lot worse than shooting me, that time. I woke up totally incapacitated, the mark got hold of me, and Cobb ran out on me. Um, it was pretty bad. They had me for two days. I ended up escaping out of a second story window and I tracked Cobb down again. He wouldn't talk to me. He was in his hotel room, drunk off his ass, and he said what happened to me wasn't his fault, I should have been faster. He said he wished everyone would just leave him alone because he deserved what he got, that he was a terrible person anyway, a fuck up. When I wouldn't leave, he, uhh, he pulled a gun on me.

"Eames, what I'm telling you is that there was a time when I really thought that Cobb was guilty. I don't mean guilty in that he was guilty of incepting Mal and allowing her to die. I mean, I thought, you know. He did it. He pushed her. And that maybe he'd done it to wake her up. And that next, he was going to wake me up, too.

"I was a kid then, in my twenties and I don't think we were talking at the time, I was mad at you because, I don't know, we'd fucked a few times and then I didn't hear from you while Cobb and I were on the run. And then Cobb's projections kept ripping me to shreds, and Cobb was fucking up our jobs and leaving me to take the heat, and then there he was pointing a gun in my face and for a minute I was just like, 'Fuck it. Pull the trigger.' I didn't actually think I would make it out of that alive. How did I? How did we live through that, Eames? How did we not get killed?"

Arthur sighed, rubbing at his thin hair, what was left of it.

"I just, I don't know. I'm saving this story to tell you after I'm gone. Sometimes I remember why I'm recording these things. I could have died back then, and I didn't. I ended up here, with this ring on my finger, waiting for you to get out of the shower. Don't be mad at Cobb about that, not now. I'm not. He was a good man, he just made some mistakes. Grief can do that to a person, it can turn you into someone else. Don't let that happen to you, Eames. No matter when I go, or what the circumstances are, don't let me drag you down like that. That's all I want. Okay?"

Off screen, Eames heard the sound of a door closing. He had the most nauseating sense of reality shifting around him. That sound was him, closing the upstairs door, and then coming down the stairs. He remembered that night. Eames-of-the-past, coming down stairs to be with Arthur-of-the-past. Arthur-of-the-past would shut the camera off quickly, and Eames-of-the-past would be none the wiser, and would wrap him up in his arms and kiss him and ask if there was anything he needed, like a glass of wine, or a backrub, or a sparring match outside, or anything at all. Eames hated his past self, hated that fucker for having the privilege of touching Arthur instead of seeing him only on the screen, as his ashes rested on the bureau across from the bed. Everything that Arthur had been now fit into a black urn and a jump drive.

Arthur-of-the-past tapped the camera, as if to get his attention.

"Hey. Don't do that to yourself, Eames. I love you."

And then the screen went black.

** ** ** ** 

Ten months after Arthur died, Eames did something he thought he would never do again. He laughed.

Time had forced him to move on. He didn't have a say in this. He needed to leave the house to buy food and supplies. He had to go back to the clinic. Every day, it seemed, a new person would approach him and tell him how sorry they were, how they had loved Arthur, what Arthur had done for them, or what an impact he had made. And they always ended with "If you need anything, let me know." Eames came to know that this really meant, "I hope like hell you don't need anything, because I can't provide you with it."

One day, a man came up to him outside of the clinic. He was in his sixties, skinny and bald, with a goatee. He greeted Eames like they'd known each other forever, although Eames had never seen him before.

"I just want to say," the guy said, "I followed Arthur's work since the beginning. Guess you could say I was kind of a fanboy. I got to meet him once, at the West coast clinic. He was a great man, Mr. Eames. A true badass. I'm really sorry for your loss, man." He shook Eames's hand and left him standing there.

This sort of thing happened to him a lot.

He was in town one November day, being human and practical and running errands, when he ran into Fiona and Mallorie on the lakefront. (The boardwalk was decorated for the holidays. Even though Christmas had never meant much to him or to Arthur, this still somehow angered him.) 

Mallorie was four. It occurred to him that Fiona had been four years old when he and Arthur had met her. Mallorie was wearing a blue shirt under her coat. She was a tiny replica of her mother. _GOT MOZART?_ he thought, and was struck with such a sense of deja vu that he only stared at them for a moment.

Mallorie was holding a leash, which was attached to a wiggling black puppy.

_History doesn't repeat itself. History clones itself. Then where is my Arthur?_

But he pushed those thoughts aside and forced a smile, which he had gotten used to doing over the last few months. After six months or so, people expected them again, and didn't understand it if you didn't at least pretend.

"What have you got there?" he asked, leaning down to scratch the yipping little thing.

"Oh," Fiona said, "she really wanted a dog. I remembered how good a dog Savannah was, so we went to the shelter and found another black lab. They're good with kids."

"How nice," Eames said. 

"How are you doing, Mr. Eames?" Fiona asked.

"Fine," Eames lied. "Thank you." He went back to scratching the dog. His hips and back ached like hell when he crouched down, but it was better than looking Fiona in the eyes. "Are you going to take good care of your puppy?" he asked Mallorie.

"Yup," she said. She did that strange little hop that children did for no reason, shifting from foot to foot. (Fiona had never done that.) The puppy jumped on her, then it lay down on the ground and rolled over.

"Have you thought of a name for it?" he asked.

"Yup." She jumped up and down again. "I name it Twat."

"Oh, Jesus Christ," Fiona said. "Mallorie, you shouldn't..."

Eames stood up on creaking legs, laughing. It started out as a chuckle, because it was funny when children said rude things and embarrassed their parents. In fact it was brilliant. Fiona looked mortified. "I don't know where she heard... You're not supposed to scold... Oh my god..."

"Twat," Mallorie repeated. "It's a family name. Twat Twat Twat Twat," she sang, with an actual melody.

His amused chuckle built to an actual laugh. It was one that didn't want to happen, that he tried to fight, because, fuck, Arthur was dead, Arthur wasn't around to hear this, and how could he be laughing in the face of the rest of his days without Arthur? How could anything ever be funny again? But he couldn't hold it back. The laughter burst out of him unbidden, guilty and terrible.

Fiona tried to hold back, the way that people did when they weren't sure if their laughter would offend you or not. (That was the other thing: people felt guilty over their own happiness sometimes.) But she laughed with him, red-faced and awkward. 

"Well," he told them both, "thank you for the laugh, anyway.

"Glad to be of service," Fiona said. "And if you need anything..."

"Yes, of course." He was never quite in the mood to hear the rest of that anymore.

He left them to their business and went home, still laughing in his car, wishing that he could tell Arthur about the dog named Twat ("It's a family name!") 

But he couldn't tell Arthur. So instead, he let Arthur speak to him.

A few weeks later, he got to the end of Arthur's recorded messages. He'd dragged it out for as long as he could, but, like life, words were finite. Arthur-of-the-past got older and older ( _"Hey Eames, so Ariadne just came to visit..." "Eames, you gave me the scare of a lifetime. I never want to see you like that again. Thank you for staying with me, though. I understand. Thank you."_ )

And then there was one left. It was like saying goodbye to Arthur all over again, and once again, Eames hated him for it. He wished that Arthur could be aware of his anger, so that he would be sorry.

He played the video anyway. 

"Hey, Eames. Let's see. We went hiking again tonight. Thanks for that; you know I can't keep up with all the jogging. You said you were going to show me a bear. You're going to show me that constellation, aren't you?" Off screen, Eames called Arthur to come outside. Arthur smiled at the camera. "I know you too well, Eames. But still. Thank you."

** ** ** **

He went on working. People said, "That's great, it's what Arthur would have wanted."

That might have been the case, but Arthur didn't want anything, as he was gone. Eames went back to work because there was nothing else for him to do. He couldn't spend the rest of his life shut away inside a big, empty house. And he hadn't painted anything, either. Nor did he want to. The barn remained closed and locked; he didn't want to see it.

So he did seminars on forgery, and lately, on the history of dreamshare. He was one of its founders, and he had the kind of first-hand information that people just didn't have anymore.

Saito's death at age ninety-two was a surprisingly understated affair. There were a few articles about him; this great, reclusive man who, it turned out, had had a hand in nearly everything. But mostly, stories about him stayed under the radar. People didn't care too much about the man behind the curtain, which was how Saito had wanted it. His death left Eames and Ariadne as the two great dreamshare pioneers. National treasures, they called them.

Out of loneliness or boredom or desperation, Ariadne moved to the East coast. She did seminars with him sometimes. They had dinner together, and they talked often. It was something like comfort. He could talk with her about Arthur, because she'd known him in the way the others hadn't. They could talk about Cobb, too. 

Sometimes Ariadne would ask him, "Eames, do you ever think..." and then not finish the thought. 

"I try not to," Eames would quip, only half joking.

Ariadne came up to the house sometimes. She would stay over, since Autumn Road was so far away from everything else. 

They talked while Eames made dinner and Ariadne sat at the table. On one of these occasions, she murmured, "Oh, Arthur," and hid her face in her hands, so only her close-cropped, white hair was visible.

Eames turned from the counter to look at her.

"Don't mind me," she said. "I just miss him. I've been without Dom for a long time now. Arthur's just more recent and it catches up to me."

Seeing her weep for Arthur lifted some invisible weight off of his chest. Certainly she didn't mourn the way he did, but she had known him better than anyone else in his life. She at least understood.

"Catches up to me every day," Eames said, setting two plates on the table. (Having to set two places again was still hard. This, more than her tears, made him have to grab a napkin from the counter and wipe his eyes.)

"Oh, man," she said. "Everyone was in love with Arthur, weren't they?"

He laughed. He'd never thought of it much before, but he supposed in a way they were. 

"It was weird," she went on. "I mean, everyone had a huge crush on you, Eames. Well, they still do, at the clinic anyway. You were always so damn _hot._ But Arthur inspired that kind of loyalty that just comes with love. They didn't even really know much about him."

"They certainly didn't," Eames said. "He wouldn't have been allowed to teach if they had. Arthur could be very cold, you know, when things needed doing. It's part of what made him so successful."

"That's true," she said. "But I think people sensed that, too. Like, he was smart and polite and everything, but he also gave the impression that he was not to be fucked with. Until the last, you know? They didn't even have to see him in action, the way we did. You didn't need to see him jump across an alley five stories up to know that he _would_. Everyone wanted an Arthur. But you had him."

"Yes," Eames said. "Yes, for quite a long time. I had him."

He didn't tell her about the jump drive, about how Arthur had continued to talk to him after he was gone. He still watched some of those videos from time to time. But mostly, he kept the drive hidden in Arthur's laptop case, wrapped up in one of his ties—a red one—and tucked away in a back pocket. Those videos were for him only, another part of Arthur that he would never share with anyone else, like his skin and his scent and the taste of his mouth. People had been in love with Arthur, certainly. And Arthur had shared some of his life with them, and there was some comfort in that. But these things were only for Eames.

He set out a wine glass and poured for Ariadne.

_Eames._

Arthur's voice was so loud that he startled and nearly spilled the wine.

"Eames?" Ariadne asked.

He took a breath and calmed his skittering heart. "It's nothing. I hear his voice sometimes."

"I still hear Dom, too. Even after all these years. You get so used to hearing that one voice almost every day, your mind just expects it. I hear him when I'm asleep, mostly. But sometimes when I'm awake. It doesn't actually go away. That's the weird part."

"I'm learning that," Eames said.

"They say that the pain doesn't go away, but it gets easier to deal with. I guess that's true. But it only gets easier because it has to. Otherwise the whole world would just die all at once. It's the only way that life continues."

  


And life did continue. Ariadne came and went, sometimes staying for days, and sometimes for weeks. They worked together, they wrote together, dined and sometimes watched telly together.

He never took her to any of the places he'd taken Arthur. They never went walking through the woods, or along the lakefront, or to the pond at the foot of the mountain. But they found new places to go, and after a while, he grew used to her presence.

It was strange, because Eames suspected he had never had an actual friend before – or at least not like this. He'd had associates whom he had trusted, mates whom he'd had good times with, especially when he was younger. But Arthur had been his one companion for most of his life. His job hadn't left much room for anything else. There was no way to get close to anyone, nor any real reason to.

So it was that Eames found himself in his mid-seventies with his first actual close friend. 

He slept alone every night, after saying good night to Arthur's ashes, and checking that the jump drive was still in the laptop, wrapped in Arthur's red tie.

 _Eames,_ he heard, as he drifted to sleep on some nights. _Eames. Eames._

** ** ** **

Ariadne remained in his life even after the first in a series of strokes (although they called them "Cerebrovascular Accidents") forced him to retire from PASIV use. 

The first one was very small; he might not have noticed it if one of his students hadn't pointed out that his hand was shaking. 

Another stay in the hospital—this time without Arthur by his side—and he was told he was "good as new." He wasn't. Although he hadn't lost a lot of function, it was deemed too dangerous for him to continue using the PASIV. The clinic, which followed procedure to the letter, restricted him to giving lectures.

He had a PASIV at home, but what was the point? He had nothing specific he needed to do in dreams. And he would only end up creating a projection of Arthur, anyway.

"I'll go into the dream with you, if you want," Ariadne said. "We could just build, or something. I know they say it's not good to mix the compound with your meds, but... But we live for it, Eames. So if you need to, I'll help you."

"I've never been much of an architect," Eames said. 

Living without the PASIV, it turned out, was remarkably easy.

The days went on, and some of them were better than others. Some of them were actually good, when he could walk outside and feel the sun shining on his back and warming his bones. 

_The sun on my face, the ground under my feet. The scent of the air and the sound of birds. I feel loss but I can still feel contentment._ It was his experience and he was still owning it. He was, after all, a creature filtering reality through all of his senses. What else was there?

He wasn't trying to be content or happy, or any specific thing. But sometimes he was anyway.

During the beginning of the next Spring, Ariadne disappeared for a few weeks. Eames figured she was working on some job, or writing for a journal, or having something written about her (she was on the cover of a great deal of magazines, looking sharp and bright with her silver hair, her eyes still wondrous.) She disappeared a lot, the way all of them tended to. He had never minded when Arthur did it, and surely he didn't worry when Ariadne did. 

This time when she returned in late Spring, it was with sagging shadows under her eyes. She was about ten pounds lighter. It was raining as they sat in the kitchen he'd shared for so long with Arthur. The ground smelled warm, like summer was thinking about making an early entrance.

Eames made her tea and she said, "I had some tests done. It doesn't look too good."

"I see," Eames said. 

Arthur had departed with such dignity, with a gracious "thank you," like an actor leaving the stage. Ariadne would face down doctors, and scars, and radiation burns.

 _Eames._ Arthur's voice came to him, as if from across or above the waves of an ocean.

"I'll stay with you, yeah?" he asked Ariadne. "If you would like me to."

She sipped her tea and said, "I would like that, yes."

He did, and it didn't take long. Doctors said phrases like "six to nine months," but that meant nothing to dreamers, and even less to people of his age. When you were twenty, Eames mused, one year was a twentieth of your life. When you were eighty, one year was a breath.

And Ariadne was gone in a breath.

The world mourned for her, another pioneer, a figure of inspiration. Eames got messages and phone calls (how did people even get his number? He had hidden it for so long. But technology was far ahead of him now.) They asked him for the real story, they wanted to interview him, to dig a little deeper and find out the dirty, hidden parts of Ariadne. How she had broken into people's minds, if she had betrayed anyone, all the times she put a toe wrong. And of course Cobb came back up; the unsolved mystery. What was her involvement with him? Had she helped him murder his wife? 

He gave them nothing. After a while, he stopped answering his phone entirely.

 _Eames,_ he heard Arthur say, weeks, months after Ariadne was gone and the house on Autumn Road was winter-silent. He needed more than that whisper borne of wishful thinking.

He dug out Arthur's laptop, unwound his red tie from the jump drive, and plugged it in. He talked with Arthur all night, anticipating what he was going to say next.

Still: _Eames,_ he heard as he slept. And other words, too, muddled ones that he couldn't make out. Sometimes Arthur's voice was urgent, as if trying to convey some message to him. 

In his dream, he heard a terrible banging, and crashing from downstairs. He fled down the stairs on legs that didn't creak or hurt, faster than he could have in real life, to find all the doors rattling. As if some angry ghost was trying to get inside, but why? 

He looked out of the kitchen window where he could see the door to the pantry. A black bear was rattling the door, scratching and clawing to get in. It howled as it threw its body against the door, splintering it.

Eames awoke in a panic, heart pounding, wondering what he was supposed to do, what this meant.

Nothing, he supposed, when he calmed down. Nothing. He didn't know why he was panicking, or what was so urgent that his mind was making up some message from Arthur. He had nothing to be afraid of, because he had nothing left to lose. 

Nothing except this old, beloved house.

** ** ** **

 

Eames was in the super market on a winter day, absently looking at ingredients on the back of a can, when he discovered he couldn't read.

He grabbed the sleeve of a young woman passing by. "Please help me," he tried to say, "something is happening to me."

Her look of panic clued him in that he probably hadn't spoken correctly, either. "Don't worry, sir," she said, "I'll get help." 

She was blond. _Phillipa? Fiona? Mallorie?_ Or maybe any one of his past students. Had one of those girls come walking up his driveway one time, bringing cookies or cake or pie? Had one or all of them been to Arthur's funeral? It was too confusing.

He remembered her dialing her phone. There were some voices. And then silence. 

When he next opened his eyes, it was to a painfully bright light. He tried to slap it away. A weathered face moved into view, a man he'd never seen before. 

"Mr. Eames," the man said, "can you hear me?"

 _Yes, I can hear you,_ he tried to say, but the words wouldn't come out. Just sounds that made little sense. He could actually hear himself not making sense. He tried again. _Yes. I can hear you._ Still nothing.

He understood words just fine, though. When he heard doctors and nurses discussing him, he knew exactly what it meant. He was cognizant and his memory was clear. There was no dementia. He just couldn't make himself understood. He also couldn't walk. So when he heard them talking about home care not being an option since he lived alone, he understood with perfect clarity that he had lost Autumn Road, as well.

They moved him to a place called a "rehabilitation clinic." That was ridiculous, because people went home from rehabilitation, and Eames knew that this new place was his home now.

"I'm not stupid," he tried to tell them. "I know I'm not leaving here."

Phillipa came to visit him on the first day in this new place. She was in her fifties. She sat across from him in a badly decorated room, took his hand, and looked at him with eyes that said, _I know I'll come to this, too._

"Yes," he told her quite clearly. 

"I'm sorry, Mr. Eames," she said. 

_Go to Autumn Road,_ he wanted to tell her. _Please. Go to Autumn Road and gut it. Do for me what Arthur did for your father._ But the words wouldn't come out.

"Arthur's tie," he said, after struggling for a few minutes to get something out. "I need. Arthur's. Tie." The jump drive was hidden in that red silk tie. How could he tell her exactly where to find it?

"Arthur's what?" she asked, frustrated. "I'm sorry. Be patient with me."

"I. Want. Arthur's. Red. Tie."

"Oh!" she said. "His die. I don't know where that is, Mr. Eames. I wouldn't even begin to know."

Before he even thought about telling her no, she had gotten it wrong, and god damn it, why couldn't he just _speak_ , the strangest thing occurred to him.

He didn't know where Arthur's red die was, either. Nor his own poker chip.

Her time to visit him was over before he got the chance to explain any of this to her.

His days split into sections. Doctors. Food. "Free" time, although he couldn't exactly count himself as free. And speech therapy. 

To his amazement, speech actually did return, in pieces. And the people who worked with him were nice enough. He was nice back to them, when they didn't frustrate him. When he didn't frustrate himself.

"I want. Arthur's. Red tie," he said to all of them. And now it was about more than the hidden jump drive. Now, he just wanted it to hold onto. Something of his, some article of clothing, or a book Arthur had read, or touched. Something with an atom of Arthur on it, anything.

When he slept, he dreamed of Autumn Road, but he dreamed of other things, too. Mombasa, and hiding out in Yusuf's home when Cobol found out that he was linked with Cobb and Arthur. Getting stoned with Yusuf and having brilliant breakthroughs that neither of them would remember. England, his first flat, the group of criminals he used to run with in his youth. Way before dreaming. The first woman he'd loved. The first man he'd loved – that entire little ill-advised venture. He dreamed of the military, the war that had almost ruined him, and of Project Somnacin. He dreamed of snow in Russia and sun in Africa, of seeing Saito in Japan. He dreamed of the whole world, because he had seen it.

That was his "free" time.

He tried to dream of Arthur, and found that he couldn't. Some part of his damaged brain blocked him from having a proper dream about him. He thought of him plenty: the long lines of his suits, the curl of his hair at the back of his neck, slender fingers, a scar on his arm. It was with pure, angry lust, sometimes, that he imagined Arthur. Arthur in Hawai'i, Arthur cleaning the PASIV, Arthur firing a gun, Arthur in his bed. Anyone who thought that age and infirmity brought purity was kidding themselves. The years hadn't dulled his urges at all, not where Arthur was concerned.

But his subconscious was unable to dream Arthur up, to make him real again. Arthur refused to be a projection, even as his voice teased Eames during the day.

Fiona came to see him, when he was able to speak in more than garbled syllables. He had almost the same conversation with her that he'd had with Phillipa. "I want Arthur's red tie," he tried to tell her. Making his tongue form consonants was still a problem.

She came back a day later clutching something in her palm. He thought that there was no way her hand would fit around the red tie with the jump drive in it, and he was right.

Fiona sat across from him in the tacky room and opened her palm. Arthur's red die, and Eames's own red poker chip, were nestled together in her hand.

"Is this what you wanted?" she asked. 

He looked her in the eye and said, "No."

She closed her hand again. "All right, Mr. Eames. I understand."

He wasn't certain that he did, though.

He had a nurse, a nice little lady who came to bring him his medicine (what for?) and his food (not all that bad, really.) She was small and reminded him of Ariadne, a bit. Her name was Anne, which was good because that was easy to pronounce.

She took him outside on warm days. He listened to the birds and smelled the grass. The facility had a fountain in front of it, with fish spouting water from thick lips, greened with age. It smelled of chlorine, and was downright tacky, but the sound of water was nice. He preferred it to the indoor room, which was always stuffy (why did they assume that all old people felt cold? Eames still felt too warm,) and was decorated in such a way as to remind everyone of their delicate age.

Outside was much better—it was quite lovely, actually--and Anne took him out in his chair when she had the time. 

"I want," he said to her.

"I know," she said. "Arthur's tie. I'm afraid I don't have it, Mr. Eames. I'm sorry."

"No," he said. "Sometimes. Just. Arthur."

He hated her pitying (kind) face, hated her for telling him that Arthur was gone. He knew that. He wasn't stupid and he wasn't senile or delusional. He was just making a statement.

"I just want to see him, you know. My Arthur." The words came out smoothly, surprisingly coherent.

"I know, my love," she said, patting his hand. "You've made such progress, Mr. Eames, with your speech therapy. It makes me happy." 

It was nice that it made her happy, and slightly less frustrating when he could make himself understood. But it also didn't matter. He wasn't going to be giving any lectures anymore.

Still. He regained his ability to read and write. He could do a crossword on the tablet. There were also card games. He could go outdoors when it wasn't too hot or too cold, with one of the tablets, and play against the computer. His hands were weak and arthritic, and sometimes he would click the wrong card and lose the game.

But he still knew the rules.

He lost some time in a blur. He wasn't sure how long, but he sensed it was probably quite a while. Days? Months, years, perhaps. 

"You're eighty-nine today, according to your birth records," Anne told him one day.

His birth records were a lie, but the year had always been correct.

Had he really lived for so long without Arthur? Seventeen years, by his calculations. Maths was never his strong point, but he could subtract. It didn't feel like that long, but, he supposed when you were close to ninety, seventeen years was just a fraction that went by in a breath. 

_Eames,_ Arthur called to him. 

One day, the garbled sounds he'd heard in Arthur's voice began to come across clearer.

_Eames. Come on._

There were days when he choked on nothing but air, suffocating slowly, and the frustration of not being able to breathe was worse than any pain. On those days, Arthur's voice sounded closer to him.

_Eames._

_Come on._

When that happened, it was the other voices that sounded muddled and distant.

One morning, his limbs felt too heavy to move. His lungs, his head, his entire body filled with pressure bearing down on him. He physically felt his heart struggling to do its job, unable to keep up. His body was full of water. Somber voices spoke of heart failure, left-sided and right-sided, but it made no difference to him. His lungs were filled with fluid and so were his legs. 

Someone was crying over him, and that was completely irritating.

He opened his eyes a few times. Looked out of the window (sun, blue sky, pretty – the world was so pretty sometimes.) Looked up (faces, doctors, ladies, blonde. Fiona? Phillipa?) He still was not senile or confused. He was completely aware that people were saying goodbye to him.

He dreamed. Finally, after so many years, Arthur came to him in a dream.

Arthur as he had been, that indefinable age that must have been his thirties, sleek and beautiful. The sun glared behind him, too bright, until his shadow fell over Eames, blocking it out. 

Arthur held his hands out. The air shimmered around him and his black hair fanned out like a halo. Eames almost laughed – would have done if he could breathe. This? This was the projection that came to him in his death dream? His subconscious had chosen to manifest Arthur as an idealized, angelic version of the man, floating out of a white light, wearing a white shirt and blue jeans, holding out his hands.

 _Come with me. It's all right. I'm here._ Arthur's mouth didn't move, but Eames heard these words in his voice anyway. _Come and be with me again, Eames. We have all the time in the world._

He didn't have the strength to move. Arthur took his hands anyway.

He had the oddest sense of rising up very slowly, and reaching for something above him. A place where there was air.

Death was slow. Maybe even eternal. Perhaps it would stretch out the last few firings of his neurons into some unknown, endless future. What else was limbo but the dilation of time? Of course death would feel the same way. His final breath could last for a hundred years.

_Eames. Eames. Please. God, please, Eames, please._

Arthur's voice, begging him. He could never say no to Arthur.

_He breaks the surface of the water then, the weight no longer bearing down on him, and he breathes. Arthur breathes with him, gasping, dripping on him, the sun in his hair and in his eyes. Arthur is laughing, or maybe crying. Then he's fading again and Eames doesn't know why. Please, Arthur, don't let me go again, don't let me go back to that place._

But he did go back, briefly at least. It seemed to be a process, this dying thing, instead of something that happened all at once, and stayed done. There were those voices again, talking now as if it was over. His eyes were closed, but there were doctors around him, he could tell. They all sounded the same.

The pressure was gone, though. He ached (he supposed that even in his dying dream, he would still feel the lingering senses of pain, at least for a while,) but he could breathe. What would he see when he opened his eyes again? More angelic visions of Arthur? 

"Eames," Arthur's voice said. He sounded close this time. "Time to come home. Come back. Where have you been?"

_Oh, Arthur. I've been everywhere. I've seen everything, and much of it was without you. But this time. This time you'll live._

He opened his eyes. Arthur looked hazy around the edges; Eames's eyes burned. But he felt real. Arthur felt real, for a death-dream. He supposed that was all right. When Arthur took his hand and kissed it, that felt even more real.

_Finally._

"My Arthur," Eames said. "My love."

 

-End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author's notes, if you'll bear with me and indulge me for another few minutes?_
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> When I was just out of college (the first time,) there was this one guy, and I fell in love with him like a total idiot. He was sort of more in love with his dead ex wife and his addiction than anything else and he barely looked at me. Still, I had picked out the house I thought we'd live in and everything. When you're an idiot, you think you can save people. But you can't, and he died when he was 34. It's okay; I was kind of over my idiocy by then.
> 
> What I learned was that you don't actually need another person to be happy, and that for as much as you love someone, and as much as you think, at the time, that you could never survive without them, you actually do. The world is really quite a nice place. I don't really require the kind of relationship I wrote about in these stories, you know?
> 
> Almost three years ago, my Gran died. We were very close; she did her share of raising me. I was with her when she died of heart failure. It was pretty quiet and she said some really amazing things before she left. In fact her last words were to me, my Mom, and my two cousins as she was dying: "Love each other."
> 
> Four months later, I was with my Dad as he died, too. It was completely out of nowhere, with no warning whatsoever, a lightning strike. He and my Mom had the kind of relationship you'd call "soulmates" if you believe in things like souls and such (the kind of thing I had hoped to have with that first guy back then.) You would never believe that a bond like that could end and that the remaining person could go on, but she does, every day, and sometimes with a great amount of joy.
> 
> So I guess the point of this is that it doesn't matter how you believe this story ends. Whether you think that they get another chance, or that they're both dead and that's it, or that life is but a dream and there is no real beginning or end, or whatever. What matters is that we all come to the same thing, but really, it ain't so bad. Life goes on for those who remain, and sometimes, it goes on brilliantly. It's a happy ending. ^_^ We all have happy endings, and then sad endings, and then happy ones again.
> 
> This whole verse spans about 357,000 words, you guys. Thank you for reading it, thank you for all the comments, the beautiful art, the insight, and the love.
> 
> Neomeruru, for everything you've done for this fic, and for your incredible patience and beautiful art, THANK YOU.
> 
> And, duh, INCEPTION. Thank you, Inception.


End file.
